Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

BIRMINGHAM CORPORATION BILL

As amended, considered; to be read the Third time.

PETITION

Mr. Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn

Mr. Wilkins: It is my privilege to present to the Honourable Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled a humble Petition signed by 10,357 of the electors in the constituency of Bristol, South-East, which sheweth
That Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn, who has been four times returned to Parliament as the Member for the said constituency of Bristol, South-East, now stands in immediate danger of disqualification solely because of an inheritance for which he is not responsible and which he wishes to renounce.
The said electors and Petitioners consider that in consequence
they may be unjustly denied their right of free choice in the Member they have elected to represent them in the present Parliament.
Wherefore Your Petitioners most humbly pray that this Honourable House will immediately take into consideration their present grievance and take whatever action is necessary … to safeguard their right to choose their own Member to serve in the Commons House of Parliament and more particularly to safeguard the right of the said Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn to continue as such for so long as he may be elected according to law …
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray, &amp;c.
I beg you, Mr. Speaker, to instruct the Clerk of the House to read this Petition to the House.

Petition read.

To lie upon the Table.

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

Married Quarters

Mr. Wingfield Digby: asked the Minister of Defence how many Service married quarters have become redundant in the last four years; what was their original cost; and what arrangements were made for their disposal.

The Minister of Defence (Mr. Harold Watkinson): The number is 844. Their original cost was about £1,250,00. A total of 590 have been transferred to other Government Departments, leased or sold, and the disposal of the remainder is being negotiated.

Mr. Wingfield Digby: Will my right hon. Friend tell me how many have been returned to local authorities, which was envisaged in the Armed Forces (Housing Loans) Act?

Mr. Watkinson: I am afraid that I cannot do so without notice, but I will gladly do so if my hon. Friend tables a Question.

Expenditure

Mr. Wingfield Digby: asked the Minister of Defence how the net expenditure on defence for 1960–61, as at present forecast, compares in real terms with the net expenditure for 1952–53 of £1,392 million.

Mr. Watkinson: The latest forecast of net expenditure on defence for 1960–61 is about £1,606 million. On the second basis referred to in my reply to the hon. Member's Question of 29th March, this would be equivalent to about £1,130 million at 1952 prices.

Mr. Wingfield Digby: Is it not then a fact that over the eight last years, in real terms, there has been a decrease in defence expenditure?

Mr. Watkinson: These statistics are based, as my hon. Friend knows, on different foundations, one on the consumer price index and the other, we hope, on a more realistic figure. I think that the best picture is given by saying that in 1952 the percentage of the gross national product taken by defence was 10·4, that


in 1960–61 it was 7·2 per cent. and that we expect that in 1962–63 the figure will be very slightly less than this. I think that that is the fairest picture.

Fighter Command

Mr. Burden: asked the Minister of Defence whether he will now make a further statement on the integration of Fighter Command into the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation air defence system.

Mr. Watkinson: As a next step I am arranging for General Norstad to be given formal notice of the assignment of Fighter Command to N.A.T.O., in accordance with the decision on unified air defence taken last year by the North Atlantic Council. The assignment will take effect from 1st May, 1961. It will improve the air defence capability of the whole area including the United Kingdom.
The Fighter Command forces assigned to SACEUR will be the air defence fighter squadrons and the operational units of the Bloodhound Mark 1 S.A.G.W. system and of the control and reporting system. The size, composition, rôle and deployment of these forces will remain matters for our own decision.
Air Marshal Sir Hector McGregor, the Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Fighter Command, is being nominated for appointment by SACEUR as Commander, United Kingdom Air Defence Region. SACEUR's responsibilities for air defence in the United Kingdom Region will be exercised through the Commander.

Mr. Burden: Can my right hon. Friend say whether, under this arrangement, N.A.T.O. could deploy Fighter Command aircraft overseas?

Mr. Watkinson: No. I should like to make that plain. N.A.T.O. cannot deploy Fighter Command aircraft overseas except with the strict permission of Her Majesty's Government.

Mr. Rankin: What contribution will N.A.T.O. make under this arrangement for the upkeep of Fighter Command?

Mr. Watkinson: The hon. Member expressed this very well in a supplementary question which he asked me on 8th February, when he said that he presumed that this is

an attempt to provide defence in depth."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 8th February, 1961; Vol. 633, c. 379.]
This is entirely correct. We now get the great advantage of the forward radar coverage and the forward fighter screen far further forward in Europe, as part of our N.A.T.O. air defences.

Nuclear Weapons

Mr. Swingler: asked the Minister of Defence what discussions he had during his recent talks with the United States Defence Department about the circumstances under which the West might initiate the use of nuclear weapons.

Mr. Watkinson: I have nothing to add to the Answer I gave on 29th March to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell).

Mr. Swingler: Does the Minister recall the Press reports just before Easter to the effect that President Kennedy was prepared to make a declaration abandoning the threat to initiate nuclear war under any circumstance? Was not the right hon. Gentleman reported in many newspapers here as objecting to this and as being an obstacle to the United States Defence Department in such a declaration being made? Would he care to comment on these reports or to repudiate the suggestion that he is in any way objecting to a declaration abandoning the suicidal threat to initiate nuclear war?

Mr. Watkinson: I do not think—with respect to him—that the hon. Member has his facts quite right. I understand that President Kennedy's words—and I think that this was a verbatim report—were:
Our arms will never be used to strike the first blow in any attack.
That is also the policy of Her Majesty's Government.

Mr. Healey: Is not the statement which the Minister has just made in flat contradiction to the statement made on the same subject in the Defence White Paper in 1958?

Mr. Watkinson: Not at all.

Mr. Swingler: Does that statement mean that the Government have abandoned the threat to initiate nuclear war in certain circumstances, as said in the White Paper?

Mr. Watkinson: The hon. Member has a right to interpret any statement as he thinks fit.

Mr. Swingler: What is the right hon. Gentleman's interpretation?

Mr. Watkinson: The Government's position is plain and has been made so on a great number of occasions. We will retaliate to any aggression with whatever force we deem necessary in any particular set of circumstances.

Oral Answers to Questions — RAILWAYS

Weed Sprays

Mr. Farr: asked the Minister of Transport if he will issue a general direction to the British Transport Com mission that, this year, when weed spraying on the railways, non-toxic sprays be used.

The Minister of Transport (Mr. Ernest Marples): No, Sir. I am told that British Railways use only non-toxic weed killer and that no change in this respect is envisaged.

Mr. Farr: May I thank my right hon. Friend for that assurance that non-toxic sprays will be used, especially as I am advised that no fewer than 3,000 miles of railway embankment will shortly be sprayed by the Commission?

Oral Answers to Questions — ROADS

Construction Costs

Mrs. Slater: asked the Minister of Transport what estimate he has made of the extra cost of road-making resulting from the identical tendering of firms to local authorities for materials needed in this work.

Mr. Marples: I have received no representations on this score, nor have I any evidence that any measurable increase in construction costs arises in this way.

Mrs. Slater: Would the right hon. Gentleman be interested if I sent him the last list of tenders which the Stoke-on-Trent authority had? Would he be prepared to take it up with his other right hon. Friend, because every local authority is deeply concerned that these rings and monopolies keep up the price of these commodities which are essential

to road making? If the right hon. Gentleman wants more road-making done, is not this one way in which he could save expenditure?

Mr. Marples: I should be very glad of any evidence which the hon. Lady has, but the question of restrictive trade practices is for the President of the Board of Trade. If the hon. Lady writes to me I will certainly look into it.

Flyover, Hammersmith

Mr. Gresham Cooke: asked the Minister of Transport when the Hammersmith flyover will be completed; and if there will be an official opening ceremony.

Mr. Marples: I expect the flyover to be completed in December this year. There will probably be an official opening. This will be for the London County Council to arrange and it is too early to say what form it might take.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: Is my right hon. Friend aware that many people from the west of London will be very grateful when this rather beautiful flyover is open? Will he confirm or deny the rumour that it will be officially called the Marples Ridgeway?

Mr. Marples: I do not know what it will be called, because I now have no interest in that firm except that of moral pride.

Mr. Jeger: Will the right hon. Gentleman see that before the opening ceremony the huge nameplates "Marples", which are scattered all over it, are removed in order that people can see the flyover?

Mr. Marples: That matter is now outside my control.

Doncaster By-pass

Mr. Jeger: asked the Minister of Transport whether he is aware that the traffic queues extended for five miles at Doncaster during the Bank Holiday week-end; and what steps he is now taking to expedite the building of the Doncaster by-pass.

Mr. Marples: Yes, Sir. The by-pass is being completed as quickly as possible and should be open to traffic by the beginning of August.

Mr. Jeger: Has the Minister thought of what the traffic hold-ups are likely to be at Whitsun, which is the next Bank Holiday period? Can not he expedite the work by having shifts working at night and weekends?

Mr. Marples: The completion date of the contract was 22nd June next. Adverse weather has slowed down the earth works. Therefore, it is hoped that the by-pass will be opened in time for August Bank Holiday. It would not be possible to do what the hon. Gentleman suggests.

Mr. Wilkins: Is not the Minister aware that this is not necessarily the solution to this problem? On Easter Sunday there was a terrific hold-up on the Chester by-pass. On Easter Monday there was a hold-up on the main Manchester-Chester route. Is not the trouble that traffic is held up in cities or small towns? It moves freely on by-passes. We have to give consideration to road improvements in cities and towns.

Mr. Marples: A by-pass considerably relieves congestion in a town, because through traffic can take the by-pass and not go through the town.

By-pass Road, Keynsham

Mr. Leather: asked the Minister of Transport when he proposes to acquire the land necessary for the proposed bypass road at Keynsham in Somerset.

Mr. Marples: I cannot purchase all the land required for the scheme until the side road Order is made. This was published in draft in September, 1960, and I am now considering the numerous objections made to it.

Mr. Leather: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the intention to acquire this land was made public thirteen years ago and the notice to treat was given over two years ago? Since then absolutely nothing has happened. Can he give us an adequate explanation for the delay and an assurance that we shall get on with it at long last?

Mr. Marples: My hon. Friend is not Tight in his statement. The side road Order was published in draft in September, 1960, and during the three months statutory period numerous objections were received from local residents and from the county council. They

have to be taken into account. There are many difficulties entailed because many people are objecting and it is most unlikely that we shall be in a position to finalise the Order. We may have to re-publish it. Under our normal land acquisition procedures we cannot do very much until the side road Orders are made.

Mr. Leather: asked the Minister of Transport when the route for the proposed by-pass road at Keynsham in Somerset was designed.

Mr. Marples: The Somerset County Council, as our agent authority, was invited to prepare the detailed design in June, 1958. Again, until the side roads Order, against which a number of objections have been lodged, has been made, the design cannot be finalised.

Mr. Leather: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the detailed design of 1958 follows a pattern that was laid down in 1945; that since that time there has been very considerable development on the east side of Keynsham, and that if the thing is done according to the plan as it now stands the by-pass will debouch into the village of Saltford and will simply produce a worse bottleneck there? Is he further aware that the whole four-mile stretch from there to Bath is no more than a winding country track, already grossly overloaded?

Mr. Marples: That may be so in respect of traffic difficulties, but, again, a side roads Order was published in draft in September, 1960, and numerous objections have been received. Those people concerned have been given the right by this House to make those objections, and those objections must be considered, and I cannot affirm what will happen until they have been considered.

Mr. Leather: Most unsatisfactory.

Oral Answers to Questions — TRANSPORT

Commercial Vehicles (Overnight Street Parking)

Mrs. Butler: asked the Minister of Transport what consideration he has given to the dangers, as well as to the inconvenience and amenity aspect of the problem, involved in the parking of commercial vehicles overnight in the street;


and what action he proposes to take to deal with this particular aspect of the problem.

Mr. Marples: I am not aware that having commercial vehicles overnight in the street is in general dangerous. The police have powers to deal with particular cases where danger is likely to other persons using the road. If the hon. Member has any such cases in mind she may like to send details to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary. As I said in reply to the hon. Member for Brixton (Mr. Lipton) on 22nd March, the primary difficulty in dealing with the inconvenience caused is the absence so far of sufficient off-street parking accommodation.

Mrs. Butler: Is the Minister aware that since the council approached him about this there has been a fatal accident in which a heavy lorry, parked overnight, was involved in Wood Green? Since local authorities in the London transport area are prevented from making traffic regulation orders on subjects such as this, will not he initiate discussions with them to see whether some reasonable regulation can be evolved for parking in residential streets in London?

Mr. Marples: My only concern as a Departmental Minister is with the adequacy of the law. Under Section 16 of the Road Traffic Act, 1960, it is an offence to leave a vehicle where it is likely to cause danger to other persons on the road. The law is adequate in that respect. Under the Removal of Vehicles (England and Wales) Regulations, 1957, the police have powers to remove or cause to be removed vehicles which have been permitted to rest in a way dangerous to other people. The law as it stands is therefore adequate. The question of the enforcement of the existing law is for my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and the police.

Mr. Gower: Will my right hon. Friend take into account the fact that in some cases the parking of commercial vehicles is for the convenience of drivers? It may have economic advantages in that they can make a get away early in the morning, and so on. If there is no alternative provision, would it not be undesirable to indulge in a lot of prosecutions?

Mr. Marples: I think that we must draw a distinction between inconvenience and the loss of amenities, which is regrettable in itself, and leaving a vehicle in a dangerous position where it may cause damage or injury. The law as it now stands is quite adequate to deal with vehicles left in a dangerous position.

Mr. Manuel: Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that, quite apart from the aspect of danger, which can always exist although at first it may not be apparent, many thousands of commercial vehicles up and down Britain are being left in the streets overnight? Ought he not to take steps to see that the firms responsible provide garage accommodation, in the same way as the drivers of private cars are expected to provide garages in order to take their cars off the streets?

Mr. Marples: From the physical point of view, it will take a considerable time before off-street car parking in this country is adequate. In London and elsewhere it is the responsibility of local authorities to obtain sites and do what they can to provide off-street car parking. When it is provided, the commercial concerns can be forced to use off-street car parking.

Lorry Drivers (Hours and Records)

Mrs. Slater: asked the Minister of Transport if he is aware of the small fines usually imposed on road hauliers who force their drivers into working excessive hours, which frequently result in the falsifying of log books; and if he will introduce legislation to increase the minimum fine that may be imposed.

Mr. Marples: Maximum, but not minimum, penalties for hours and records offences are laid down by statute. Within those maxima, the courts decide what is fitting in individual cases. I do not think I should be justified in seeking, contrary to modern practice, to prescribe a minimum fine or term of imprisonment.

Mrs. Slater: May I thank the right hon. Gentleman for the very adequate reply on this problem which he sent to me yesterday? Is he not also aware that, while large fines have been imposed upon some of the firms he mentioned and some licences have been withdrawn, large numbers of firms in this country are escaping with very small fines, which


they do not mind at all because they can make the profit through longer hours and the greater amount of material carried? Does he not think that he should do something about this, either through publicity or by fixing a minimum fine?

Mr. Marples: It is preferable that the courts should be free to grade the penalties according to the circumstances of each particular case. I ask the hon. Lady to think of this point. If the minimum fine was fixed too high, the tendency would be, if someone thought it was excessively high, to find the person not guilty.

Mr. Speaker: ; Dame Irene Ward.

Dame Irene Ward: Question No. 12, Sir.

Mr. Strauss: rose—

Mr. Speaker: I did not see the right hon. Gentleman in time. I regret that, but I have called the next Question.

FATAL CASUALTIES AT EASTER TIME: PROVISIONAL FIGURES


Day
England and Wales
Scotland
Great Britain


1960
1961
1960
1961
1961


Thursday
…
11
19
—
1
20


Good Friday
…
22
18
—
4
22


Saturday
…
25
16
—
3
19


Sunday
…
15
11
—
2
13


Easter Monday
…
14
12
—
—
12


TOTAL
…
87
76
—
10
86


NOTE—Figures for Scotland for Easter, 1960 are not available.

Oral Answers to Questions — SHIPPING

New Cunard Liner (Member's Letter)

Dame Irene Ward: asked the Minister of Transport on what date he received a letter from the hon. Member for Tyne-mouth about his elimination of the tender from Swan Hunter's for the new Cunard liner under certain circumstances; and what reply has been sent.

Mr. Marples: I received the hon. Member's letter on 4th April. I have replied that the best tender will be accepted and that this will be determined on purely commercial considerations without regard to the location of the successful yard. What course should be adopted in the unlikely event of tenders being received

Road Accidents (Holiday Week-ends)

Mr. P. Williams: asked the Minister of Transport whether he will now make public the official figures of deaths and injuries on the roads over the Easter week-end; and whether he will make arrangements that these figures should be made available daily at all future holiday week-ends.

Mr. Marples: Figures of injuries are not yet available but I will, with permission, circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT a table of provisional figures of fatal casualties.
I hope to be able to arrange for provisional figures of fatal casualties to be made available daily at those holiday week-ends when the danger of accidents tends to be particularly high.

Mr. Williams: I am profoundly grateful for my right hon. Friend's Answer
Following is the table:

which were on all counts of equal merit is a matter which would be considered at the appropriate time.

Dame Irene Ward: While thanking my right hon. Friend for writing to say that he regretted the misunderstanding, may I ask him, before making pronouncements in future which cause great hostility in my part of the world, to consider the terms of the Local Employment Act and do some homework to learn how a great river really works in relation to shipbuilding labour?

Mr. Marples: I have some knowledge of rivers from my experience at the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. I am certain that the misunderstanding arose because of my anxiety to


give my hon. Friend all the possible information. I did not cause the misunderstanding, but I still regret it.

Council of British Shipping (Washington Visit)

Mr. P. Williams: asked the Minister of Transport whether he has considered a report sent to him by the Chamber of Shipping relating to its recent visit to Washington; and what reply he has sent.

Mr. Marples: This was a private visit undertaken by representatives of the General Council of British Shipping. I do not expect a formal report but I shall be discussing the results of the visit with the General Council in the next few days.

Mr. Williams: I wish that I could be as helpful this time. Is my right hon. Friend aware that it really is not good enough for the Government for ever to expect the Chamber of Shipping to do the task which should be done by the Ministry of Transport and the Government in making representations to the Americans about the harmful effect their shipping and trading policies are having on our shipping, and thereby our shipbuilding interests? The House should now be able to expect a statement from the Government on what their policies are and what they can do to help British shipping in relation to the Americans.

Mr. Marples: Now that we are back into the normal relationship, may I say that the representations of the Council of British Shipping are not in substitution for action by the Government but in addition to it. We and other Governments have also made formal representations about the effect of the Bonner Bill in the United States. I also wrote to our own shipping companies last December and prohibited the production of documents which in our view are outside the jurisdiction of the United States. My hon. Friend's supplementary question is based on a fallacy.

Mr. Williams: Can my right hon. Friend tell me what success the Prime Minister has had in representations he has made?

Dame Irene Ward: I have that Question down for tomorrow.

Mr. Marples: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. On the assumption that what the hon. Lady says is accurate, I cannot allow the supplementary question.

Oral Answers to Questions — POST OFFICE

Post Offices (Closing Time)

Lieut.-Colonel Sir W. Bromley-Davenport: asked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that many post offices, at closing time or a short time earlier, turn out all lights and announce that the office is closed irrespective of the number of people waiting to be served; and whether he will give instructions that the outer doors of post offices be closed just before closing time to enable those people who are on the premises to be served and thus avoid discourtesy and disappointment.

The Assistant Postmaster-General (Miss Mervyn Pike): It is the established practice to serve customers who are inside a post office at the advertised closing time. I am not aware of any departure from this practice but, if my hon. and gallant Friend will let me have details of any cases he has in mind, I shall be glad to look into the matter.

Mr. W. R. Williams: Will the hon. Lady reaffirm that she has no evidence of such practices obtaining in any of our post offices? That being so, will she be good enough to ask her hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Knutsford (Sir W. Bromley-Davenport) to give the in-formation required so that the case may be traced? If he cannot do so, will she ask him to apologise to the House and to the workers in the Post Office?

Miss Pike: I have no such evidence, but I am sure that my hon. and gallant Friend will provide me with it if he has it.

Sir W. Bromley-Davenport: Is my hon. Friend aware that the last thing I want to do is to get individual post offices into trouble? Is she further aware that the case I have in mind occurred within three miles of the House of Commons, and would she please issue a directive to the various post offices saying that, in future, customers waiting


inside should be served after closing time? Is it not very hard on customers when they have been standing in queues for some time in order to be served?

Miss Pike: I am very grateful to my hon. and gallant Friend for the interest he takes in Post Office affairs. [Interruption.] I can assure him that we will do our best to make our service as efficient as possible.

Mr. W. R. Williams: I share the hon. and gallant Gentleman's enthusiasm for the Post Office, but would not the hon. Lady agree that it would be better if we had the evidence when the hon. and gallant Gentleman is making charges of a general character against many offices without having the courage to draw attention to a specific office?

Oral Answers to Questions — TELEPHONE SERVICE

Notepaper (Telephone Numbers)

Mr. Gresham Cooke: asked the Postmaster-General whether, in the next issue of "Telephone in Business", he will recommend to telephone users that the size of type of telephone numbers on notepaper should be the same as that of the address so that it may be easily read.

Miss Pike: We are grateful to my hon. Friend for this suggestion. We agree that telephone numbers on notepaper should be easily readable and we will see that this is stressed in the next issue of the "Telephone in Business."

Mr. Gresham Cooke: I thank my hon. Friend for her reply, but would she also emphasise the fact that the telephone number on the note paper of many firms is in microscopic print and cannot be read, and that, as telephone numbers are used just as often as addresses, they should be in the same size of print?

Miss Pike: I assure my hon. Friend of that, and I hope that the fact that he has raised the matter now will help to improve the position.

Mr. G. Brown: In view of the hon. Lady's agreement with the hon. Gentleman on that score, would she also advise her Ministerial colleagues that it would be a good thing if they put their telephone numbers on their note paper at all?

Oral Answers to Questions — SPAIN (FOREIGN SECRETARY'S VISIT)

Mr. Swingler: asked the Lord Privy Seal why the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs has accepted an official invitation to visit Spain on the eve of the spring meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Council.

Mr. Healey: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will state the reasons for the forthcoming official visit of the Foreign Secretary to Spain.

Mr. Jeger: asked the Lord Privy Seal what subjects are to be discussed by the Foreign Secretary during his forthcoming visit to Spain.

The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. Edward Heath): I have nothing to add to the Answer I gave yesterday to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies).

Mr. Swingler: The Lord Privy Seal will now have had an opportunity to reflect on the inadequacy of his Answer yesterday, Would he not now consider that, since every time this kind of exchange arises, the rumour is bound to circulate that there is some proposal to bring Spain into the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, he might now bring himself to say that Her Majesty's Government will oppose the entry of Spain, under the present régime, into that organisation?

Mr. Heath: I made the position quite clear yesterday in answer to a Question from the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. Healey: But is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Foreign Secretary's visit is bound to dishearten those forces in both countries that work for more liberal régimes there? Will he, further to my hon. Friend's supplementary question, assure the House, which he did not do yesterday, that at least Her Majesty's Government do not intend to propose that Spain should become a member of N.A.T.O.?

Mr. Heath: As I say, I could not give any assurances in advance. These questions are matters for the N.A.T.O. alliance as a whole and must be considered in the light of the circumstances


at the time. That is the position. I cannot agree with the first part of the hon. Member's supplementary question. My noble Friend is carrying out the policy advocated from the opposite side of the House that we should try to improve international relations by personal contacts with other countries, regardless of their internal régimes.

Mr. Healey: While welcoming the inference that the visit of the Foreign Secretary does not imply any approval of the régimes in the countries which he is visiting, will the Lord Privy Seal answer by question; namely, do Her Majesty's Government intend to propose that Spain should become a member of N.A.T.O.? This is a matter wholly within the competence of Her Majesty's Government.

Mr. Heath: The hon. Gentleman cannot expect me to give answers to hypothetical quesions that might arise at any time in the future.

Sir H. Studholme: Is it not an excellent thing that my noble Friend should be visiting a friendly and Christian country like Spain? Is it not also quite possible that there are a great many people in this country whose manners would improve considerably if they studied those of the average Spaniard?

Mr. Dodds: Would the Lord Privy Seal bear in mind, and also draw the fact to the attention of the Home Secretary, that Spain for some years now has behaved disgracefully to Gibraltar, that Gibraltar is a most important part of the Commonwealth, and that if there is to be any liberal dealing with Spain, Gibraltar should share in whatever results?

Sir P. Agnew: Although a proposal that Spain should join N.A.T.O. may not be on the official agenda, will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that the vast majority of the people of this country are anxious to do all they can to recreate the concert of Europe and that, therefore, Her Majesty's Government should not give a discouraging reply to any suggestion made by Spain that she should take part in the defence of Western Europe by joining N.A.T.O.?

Mr. Jeger: Will the Lord Privy Seal impress on his noble Friend that the

average Spaniard, like the average Briton, would like to have civil rights—freedom of association and worship, and the other freedoms inherent in the Charter of N.A.T.O.—and that friendship between Spain and Britain would be enhanced by the introduction of such freedoms in Spain today?

Oral Answers to Questions — NEW GUINEA

Mr. Healey: asked the Lord Privy Seal what military obligations Her Majesty's Goverment have accepted to assist the Dutch Government in maintaining its claim to New Guinea.

Mr. Heath: Her Majesty's Government have accepted no commitment to give military support to the Netherlands Government in protecting their territory in Netherlands New Guinea.

Mr. Healey: I welcome that statement, but is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Dutch Secretary of State for New Guinea is reported as having stated recently in that country that the Dutch Government expected military support from Britain, the United States and Australia in the event of a major attack by Indonesia on Dutch New Guinea, and would he inform the Dutch Government that this statement is not in accordance with the facts?

Mr. Heath: I have seen that report, yes, and I have also seen the report of Dr. Bot's denial that he made the statement because, as he explained, he could not be expected to speak on behalf of the countries mentioned in the original report. At the same time, I should make it plain that we believe quite firmly that, if there is a dispute about this area, in no case should force be used.

Oral Answers to Questions — UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA (UNITED NATIONS RESOLUTIONS)

Mr. Brockway: asked the Lord Privy Seal how the United Kingdom delegation at the United Nations voted on the Afro-Asian resolution condemning apartheid in the Union of South Africa.

Mr. Heath: There are two draft resolutions, one mainly African in sponsor-Ship, the other Asian. In the vote in


Committee, the United Kingdom delegation voted against the former, but in favour of the latter. Neither has yet been voted upon by the United Nations General Assembly.

Mr. Brockway: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the relief which many Members of the House feel that at last the vote representing the United Kingdom in the United Nations has gone against apartheid? Will he explain why, in accepting the principle of being opposed to apartheid, the United Kingdom delegation did not vote in favour of the operative clauses of the resolution?

Mr. Heath: The view of Her Majesty's Government about apartheid as a policy, which is I think the view of the people of this country, has always been well known. The reasons for the vote of the United Kingdom delegation at the United Nations were fully explained by my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Mr. Smithers) in his speech about it. The reason why we did not support the operative paragraphs of the African resolution was that we do not believe that sanctions are applicable in this case.

Mr. Eden: Can my right hon. Friend say how far this vote departed from what has always been our strong position in this matter, namely, that we shall not interfere in the internal affairs of any country? Can he say why it is now possible for Her Majesty's delegate to vote in this way when hitherto we have hotly defended our refusal to do so?

Mr. Heath: This signifies no change in our belief in the importance of Article 2 (7) of the United Nations Charter concerning interference in the internal affairs of other countries. What the Government and, I think, the House felt—it was shown during the debate on the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference—was that the Conference had shown that apartheid had international reactions, and that was a justification for our vote.

Mr. S. Silverman: While deprecating the right hon. Gentleman's undue modesty in disclaiming any improvement in the behaviour of the delegation at the United Nations, may I ask him whether he will assure the House that our conduct in approving the principle but refusing to do anything about the practice was not influenced by any fear

of prejudicing current negotiations with General Franco?

Mr. Heath: There are no current negotiations with General Franco, the head of the Spanish State, and I do not think the hon. Gentleman does any credit to himself by exaggerating the position which I described in answer to Questions concerning the visit by my noble Friend.

Sir H. Legge-Bourke: Will my right hon. Friend say whether the decision to vote as we did was calculated to encourage the Union of South Africa either to stay in or to go out of the United Nations?

Mr. Heath: Of course, we hope that the Union of South Africa will remain in the United Nations.

Oral Answers to Questions — ROYAL NAVY

Fishery Protection, Icelandic Waters

Mr. Hector Hughes: asked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty if he will make a report on the activities during the last six months of Royal Navy protection vessels, in Icelandic waters, indicating the number of ships and men engaged in these operations, the cost and the results achieved to date.

The Civil Lord of the Admiralty (Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing): Until a Fishery Agreement was reached in March between Her Majesty's Government and the Icelandic Government, a patrol of two of Her Majesty's ships, each with a crew of about 200, was maintained outside 12 miles off Iceland. My right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has recently thanked my right hon. and noble Friend the First Lord for all the help and protection given to British trawlers during this period by naval vessels. During the six months ending 31st March, 1961, expenditure on fuel, in addition to normal consumption, and on the maintenance of a replenishment tanker for the patrol, amounted to about £200,000.

Mr. Hughes: Can the Civil Lord say whether these activities have done anything to resolve the conflict of interest between Britain and Iceland and the other European maritime countries? Instead of spending money in this way,


would it not be more practical for Her Majesty's Government to realise that fishing is Iceland's only industry and to invite the maritime nations of Europe to give financial aid to Iceland to found alternative industries?

Mr. Orr-Ewing: I think that the trawlers have been very thankful on numerous occasions for the help that they have had from the Royal Navy. I think that the tolerant way in which we approached this duty has helped in the settlement which has been achieved.

The Arctic (Experimental Missions)

Mr. Hector Hughes: asked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty if he will state the scientific discoveries which have resulted from the recent experimental missions beneath the Arctic ice cap by Royal Navy submarines and aeroplanes, indicating the nature and extent of under-water surveys made then or since as a result of those surveys.

Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: Her Majesty's submarines "Finwhale" and "Amphion" and aircraft of R.A.F. Coastal Command recently took part in trials designed to gain experience of operating under the ice. The object was to test items of equipment associated with such operations and to obtain operational experience. It would not be in the national interest to give further details.

Mr. Hughes: Can the hon. Gentleman say why the water under the North Pole does not freeze while the water on the surface of the North Pole does freeze? What practical result follows from the scientific experiments referred to in the Question? Is the water under the ice kept warm by the heat generated from the centre of the earth?

Mr. Orr-Ewing: In view of the hon. and learned Gentleman's interest in bathing, I can understand his anxiety about where the ice forms. If he studies the physical tables, he will find that the water is most dense at 4 degrees centigrade and rises to the surface when it reaches 0 degrees centigrade and starts to freeze.

Holy Loch (Security)

Mr. Lipton: asked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what is the cost of the

security arrangements in connection with the Polaris base at Holy Loch.

Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: These arrangements are the joint responsibility of the United States Navy, the Royal Navy and the civil police. Twenty additional personnel of the Admiralty Constabulary are being brought in at a cost of £24,000. Apart from this, no extra security costs arise so far as the Admiralty is concerned.

Mr. Lipton: Is the Civil Lord aware that apparently any Tom, Dick or Harry can get on to this submarine whenever it is in Holy Loch? According to Press reports, radio transmitters of a somewhat irregular character operate in the neighbourhood. Everyone knows everything that is going on. Are not we getting poor value for the so-called security arrangements which Her Majesty's Government and the United States authorities claim to be providing?

Mr. Orr-Ewing: When I was there the day before yesterday, I formed a good opinion of the good sense which the United States authorities, the Royal Navy and the local police have exercised in dealing with canoeists and other demonstraters.

Sir J. Duncan: Can my hon. Friend say something arising out of his recent visit to "Proteus", particularly regarding the American view of the Scottish people?

Mr. Orr-Ewing: The Scottish people have shown their normal warm-hearted hospitality. Offers of hospitality have been numerous. The captain of the "Proteus" told me that at the beginning of the trip he received on average 100 letters daily, of which 92 showed warm support for the arrival of "Proteus" and only 8 of which were critical.

Mr. Burden: Is my hon. Friend aware that a group of people who are now proceeding to the Holy Loch have stated that anything might arise when they get there? Will every effort be made to discourage any activities which might be damaging to the security of the base and to Anglo-American relations?

Mr. Orr-Ewing: This matter will be taken into consideration. Some time must elapse before we know the body of opinion. It is noticeable that all the canoeists and, persumably, most of the


marchers came from England and not from Scotland.

Mr. Manuel: Owing to the large increase in population in the Dunoon area adjacent to the Holy Loch, will the Civil Lord indicate what additional police and security arrangements will be necessary to maintain law and order? It is not only desirable people who come from England. There are others of another kind.

Mr. Orr-Ewing: I think that that does not fall within the responsibilities of the Civil Lord of the Admiralty.

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTRY OF WORKS

Embassy Offices, Saigon

Mr. Harold Davies: asked the Minister of Works if the new offices at Norodom for the British Embassy in Saigon have yet been completed; and whether the staff will now have the benefit of air-conditioning.

The Minister of Works (Lord John Hope): The offices are now under construction and should be completed in the early summer of next year They will be fully air-conditioned.

Mr. Davies: I thank the Minister for that Answer. The staff working on our behalf in these difficult climates will at last have conditions which compare a little with the American Embassy in that area. I am grateful that the Question which I tabled about two years ago has been followed up practically.

Embassy Buildings, Vientiane

Mr. Harold Davies: asked the Minister of Works what progress has been made in the building of Embassy offices and quarters in Vientiane; and whether they are air-conditioned.

Lord John Hope: The offices, the Ambassador's residence, and four houses and a flat for staff, were completed nearly a year ago. The offices are partially air-conditioned but will soon be fully air-conditioned when they are extended to meet staff increases. The bedrooms of the Residence are air-conditioned. The staff houses are not air-conditioned but were built for thorough cross-ventilation.

Mr. Davies: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, once again, I have to thank and congratulate him for that Answer? Does the Minister himself occasionally take the trouble to visit some of these more remote areas to see what has been done on his behalf there?

Lord John Hope: Yes, Sir; I do that

EXPORT CREDITS GUARANTEE DEPARTMENT

The President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Reginald Maudling): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I will make a statement about some developments in the services offered by the Export Credits Guarantee Department.
They can be summarised under three headings. The first is premium rates. The policy of the Department, and of the Advisory Council, for whose continuing help I am much in their debt, is to pay its way on the average over a period. To run consistently at a loss would be tantamount to a subsidy to exports; but neither should we aim at making a consistent profit. We have made a new assessment in the light of experience of the likely level of recoveries after major defaults, and I am satisfied that this justifies a substantial reduction in premium rates.
I have, therefore, approved a new scale of premiums for medium-term business which will reduce the total premiums charged by about 25 per cent. The main benefit of these reductions will be concentrated in those markets where at present we charge the highest rates. There will also be reductions in respect of comprehensive business in the more expensive markets.
The second heading is longer-term export finance. Any extension of the length of credit on which our goods are sold adds to the strain on our balance of payments. That is why we support the Berne Union and resist any general extension of the length of suppliers' credits. But in the case of very large capital projects and of ocean-going ships, where the return on any investment may take many years to mature, the buyer may need and expect credit going beyond five years from delivery and he can already obtain it in some foreign countries.
We are, therefore, introducing a new system whereby the Department will guarantee loans for longer periods made by financial institutions in this country to creditworthy overseas purchasers. The extent to which we can grant this facility will be limited by our balance of payments position. We shall have to be selective, therefore, in accepting individual projects and be satisfied that they will bring substantial benefit to our economy.
In highly exceptional cases, where the business could not otherwise be financed and where, in the opinion of the Government, there are compelling reasons for regarding the project as one of outstanding economic importance to the United Kingdom, supplementary finance may be provided from the Exchequer under Section 3 of the Export Guarantees Act.
The third heading relates to small exporters. In order to help small and medium-sized firms with little or no experience of exporting, I have decided to introduce a new form of export credit cover for firms with a current export turnover of less than £10,000 a year. This will be available across the counter at all branches of the Export Credits Guarantee Department and will cover small exporters in respect of transactions with individual approved buyers, at a flat rate of premium. The cover will be available for a limited time. This simple and easily accessible facility should encourage new firms to enter the export market and subsequently become customers of the Department on a normal basis.
This is, of necessity, no more than an outline of the new arrangements. I am circulating a more detailed explanation in the OFFICIAL REPORT, and I am also taking steps to make them known as widely as possible throughout industry. I believe that these developments, taken in conjunction with the improvements we have recently made—part-period cover, "matching", the general extension of special facilities originally designed for the dollar area, and the special rates for ships—together represent a major extension of the services available from the Export Credits Guarantee Department and can stand comparison with those offered by any similar institution throughout the world. It is important that they should be known and used as

widely as possible, and I should welcome any help that hon. Members can give to this end.

Mr. Jay: While we on this side always welcome extensions of the activity of this successful public service, can the President of the Board of Trade tell us, first, why it so often happens that proposals for such extension are put to the Government, are declared by the Government to be impracticable and then are duly granted eighteen months or two years later?
Secondly, can the right hon. Gentleman assure us that the facilities which British exporters will now enjoy are at least as good as any of those available to the major competitor exporting countries? One would like to be definitely sure of that in all these respects.
Thirdly, do these facilities, as I assume they do, apply to all countries to which British exports go, whether in or outside the sterling area and on both sides of the Iron Curtain?

Mr. Maudling: Yes, Sir, these facilities apply to all countries where the Department offers cover. They will amount to putting us in a position to offer facilities at least equal to those of any competitor, and in many cases much better.

Mr. Stratton Mills: Will my right hon. Friend note that what he has said, particularly about the longer-term export finance for ships, will be particularly welcomed in shipbuilding areas? Can he give further details of how the scheme will operate, particularly as regards shipping, and when it will come into effect?

Mr. Maudling: It comes into effect straight away. I thought it better to circulate the details in the OFFICIAL REPORT, otherwise I should weary the House with too long an explanation.

Mr. Rankin: Can the right hon. Gentleman make clear that the new or revised terms which he has just announced will ease the trade conducted by small exporters on a barter basis—that is, in the exchange of goods for goods? Will he also say whether these terms will definitely ease the position of exporters who try to trade with China?

Mr. Maudling: All exporters who are using the facilities of the Export Credits


Guarantee Department, to whichever country they are exporting, will find improvements in these proposals.

Mr. Leather: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the proposals that he has announced will give considerable satisfaction to many exporters, particularly in the capital goods industry, where this additional help is badly needed?
Will my right hon. Friend continue to direct his attention to three particular points? First, one of the basic reasons why many exporters still do not make full use of the excellent facilities of the Department is because of misunderstanding, which usually arises from bad representation and bad public relations by the Department. It has a very good case, but frequently it is badly put over.
Secondly, many exporters dealing with these complicated contracts find themselves in the position of having to bargain with the foreigner, on the one hand, and with the Department, on the other. They reach the right conclusion in the end, but if the officials concerned had power to agree much earlier, numbers of projects which now fail would succeed.
Thirdly, may I ask my right hon. Friend not to cease to pay careful attention to the German tax rebate system, which is still a grave disadvantage to British exporters?

Mr. Maudling: Most certainly, we will do all that we can to make these facilities widely known, by leaflet, pamphlet, speech and in every other way. That is important.
I do not accept that the decisions of the Department take a long time to reach. My impression is that the Department is staffed by people who give answers quickly and efficiently and that they compare with anyone in the world.
I do not think that the question of the German remission of turnover tax arises out of my statement. In any event, I would not accept what my hon. Friend has said.

Mr. Fletcher: Will the President of of the Board of Trade give an idea of the length of credit that will now be available to exporters of commodities to countries behind the Iron Curtain?

Mr. Maudling: Normally, commodities would be sold on short-term credits. I was dealing with long-term credit facilities for projects like steelworks, rolling mills and power stations, which, clearly, do not give a good return in less than a number of years and, therefore, long-term facilities are required. It would be against the country's interest if there were a general extension of time of repayment for the export of normal commodities.

Mr. McMaster: While welcoming the statement by my right hon. Friend and saying how much the export industry will appreciate the good work done by the Export Credits Guarantee Department, and particularly by the Advisory Council which works hard behind it, I should like to ask my right hon. Friend what attention has been given to the other proposal of the Radcliffe Committee, namely, that the smaller exporter should be able to select which risk he would like covered in order to minimise his insurance cover and so that he may be able to quote a competitive price against foreign competition?

Mr. Maudling: I am grateful for what my hon. Friend has said about the Advisory Council, which does a tremendous amount of public service. As for the small exporter, I think that my hon. Friend will find that the proposals I am making will meet his point about the person now exporting for the first time and wishing to insure individual transactions.

Mr. H. Wilson: While, of course, as my right hon. Friend has said, we all on this side welcome these concessions, which we pressed for specifically as long ago as the debate on the Radcliffe Report in November, 1959, I wonder whether the right hon. Gentleman will clear up this doubt which remains in the minds of some hon. Members, I think, on both sides of the House? It is quite clear now, is it not, that full cover will be available for trade with East Germany and that we shall not go on losing the possibility of big contracts with East Germany because of doubt about the Department's position?

Mr. Maudling: There is no reason for doubt about this. Some of the stories in the newspapers about our losing large


contracts to the French are quite inaccurate. What I am saying is that these improvements apply to all the countries for which there is E.C.G.D. cover, and that does include the Communist bloc countries.

Mr. Burden: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the very considerable facilities for assistance of small exporters particularly, and those who have not become exporters, given by a great number of London buying houses and their highly skilled employees, and will he ensure that the members of his Department are well briefed about these facts and will be able to pass this information on to individual exporters?

Mr. Maudling: I quite agree that the activities of the merchant houses and the London buying houses are extremely valuable. I take every opportunity of calling them to the attention of potential exporters.

Several Hon. Members: Several Hon. Members rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I think that we must go on to other business now.

Following are the details:

NEW EXPORT CREDITS GUARANTEE DEPARTMENT FACILITIES

Premium Rates

Medium-Term Business. A new scale of charges is being introduced.

The scale now displaced provided for heavy cumulative increases in charges both for the worse markets in comparison with the better, and for long oredit periods in comparison with the shorter. The substantial reductions in total charges now being made have been directed towards narrowing these differentials.

Countries are graded in four categories—A, B, C and D—with A commanding the finest rates. Charges in respect of D have been revised on the basis of a reduction of 40 per cent., and in respect of C of 33⅓ per cent. A and B charges have also been reduced by 5 per cent. The effect of this is that D rates will in future be three or four times as high as A rates, where previously they could have been up to seven times as high.

The reductions have been applied in such a way as to make the progressive increases smaller as the credit period lengthens. Cover on a transaction in respect of a D market which involved two years preshipment and five years subsequent credit might, under the old scale, have cost a once and for all charge of something over £10 per cent.; under the revised scale the corresponding charge would be £4 15s. And this will apply to some extent to the better markets also; for such a transaction in an A market the corresponding figures would be 38s. 9d. and 29s.

The new scale of medium-term charges comes into operation tomorrow. It is estimated that these charges, if applied to the existing pattern of medium-term business, would have meant a reduction of some 25 per cent. in income.

Comprehensive Business. Holders of comprehensive policies will, in respect of short-term business, have charges reduced by about a quarter and a third in respect of C and D markets; charges for A and B markets (which have already been reduced in this field) remain unchanged. Extended terms business will in future be related to the Medium-Term schedule, holders of comprehensive policies paying medium-term rates less, in appropriate cases, a discount; this discount varies according to the policy-holder's insured turnover and the amount of "spread" in the business offered in good markets as well as bad, and may be as much as 20 per cent.

The new charges come into operation tomorrow in respect of extended terms business, and from 1st May in respect of short term.

Long-Term Credit

The main features of these proposals are:—

(a) The Export Credits Guarantee Department is being authorised in selected oases to guarantee due repayment of loans made to overseas buyers, the proceeds to be used for making payment to United Kingdom exporters in respect of contracts appropriate for the longer-term credit contemplated; this facility will be entirely separate from E.C.G.D.'s normal business of guaranteeing suppliers oredit.
(b) Such financial guarantees should encourage banks and/or other private financial institutions to provide money for such loans to overseas buyers.
(c) These facilities will be available on a basis of strict selection: that is, to qualify for consideration a transaction will have to satisfy the requirements set out below.

First, these financial guarantees are designed to assist in facilitating the sale abroad of large capital projects normally costing not less than £2 million (excluding local expenditure). Examples are power stations, steel mills, pipelines, industrial undertakings, railway projects and possibly harbours and dams. Ocean-going ships are another example, though the lower limit will not be as high as in the case of projects. Business will not be eligible if it can be covered by credit insurance within the shorter normal supplier credit period; further, the nature of the assets created must be such that their useful life extends substantially beyond the period of the loan.

Secondly, the prospects of due repayment must be such as to satisfy normal E.C.G.D. underwriting requirements, either because the buyer is creditworthy in his own right, or can make himself creditworthy by obtaining a guarantee, for example, from his Government or central bank. The country risk will also have to be acceptable for cover. For any proposals put up in respect of the weaker markets, exceptional treatment will have to be justified on the basis of good long-term prospects leading to a lasting and profitable connection for British trade.

Thirdly, there will have to be demonstrably strong commercial grounds for gaining the contract. These would include benefit to the balance of payments, the maintenance of a position in an established market in face of competition, the development of a market with a promising longer-term outlook, and the stimulus to an industry which is short of orders but on which we expect to depend in the future for a substantial volume of profitable exports.

To sum up: it will have to be demonstrated that there are adequate prospects of due repayment of the suggested loan and that the proposed transaction is suitable in character for long-term credit and will bring economic benefit to this country.

The intention will be that, where a supplier and a buyer come together in the usual way of business, the availability of such a guarantee will enable finance to be provided from private sources. The terms of payment between buyer and seller will have to provide for the buyer to make an adequate initial down-payment, and normally a final payment (the risk on which the supplier would carry himself) on or after completion of the contract. The seller would obtain the remainder of the price out of the guaranteed loan; the buyer would repay the lender by instalments over the full term of the loan.

In highly exceptional cases, where the business could not otherwise be financed and where in the opinion of the Government there were compelling reasons for regarding the project as one of outstanding economic importance to the United Kingdom, supplementary finance might be provided from the Exchequer under Section 3 of the Export Guarantees Act.

Charges for financial guarantees will be calculated on the basis of the new rates for medium term suppliers credit.

The Department is now prepared to consider business falling within the scope of these proposals.

Small Exporters

The Department has designed a simplified "Small Exporter" guarantee which will be available from 1st May to all exporters who have not exceeded £10,000 export turnover per annum in recent years. It will be available through all the Department's offices in London and the Provinces.

The guarantee will, for short-term business, provide 90 per cent. cover against loss. Claims will be payable four months after the event

causing loss. Risks covered will be similar to those covered under normal short-term guarantees. Premium will be a flat rate of 15s. per £100 insured. Exporters will be able to cover individual buyers in any market for which cover is available, but all business with those buyers will have to be offered for insurance.

Transactions will be approved individually and a specific document, clearly stamped as covered by guarantee, will be available for an exporter to produce to his bank manager if he seeks finance.

This facility is specifically designed to meet the needs of the small business which has never exported, or has not exported on any significant scale; it is not intended for those able to make effective use of the normal E.C.G.D. cover. Once the holder of a "Small Exporter" guarantee has reached an insured turnover of £20,000 or at the end of two years, whichever is the earlier, he will be expected to use the Department's normal facilities if he wishes to continue with cover.

BALLOT FOR NOTICES OF MOTIONS

Transport (Parking)

Mr. Goodhew: I beg to give notice that on Friday, 28th April, I shall call attention to the desirability of controlling street parking and facilitating the provision of off-street parking places and garages, and move a Resolution.

Sport (Wolfenden Committee's Report)

Sir R. Glyn: I beg to give notice that on Friday, 28th April, I shall call attention to the Report of the Wolfenden Committee on Sport, and move a Resolution.

Housing (Leaseholds)

Mr. Box: I beg to give notice that on Friday, 28th April, I shall call attention to the impracticability of raising mortgages on leasehold houses having under 30 years to run, and move a Resolution.

INTESTACY (SCOTLAND)

3.35 p.m.

Mr. Hector Hughes: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the law of intestacy in Scotland.
The Bill I seek to bring in is very urgent and is essential to implement the recommendations of the Lord Mackintosh Committee. It should be approved by Members on both sides of the House, because it is not on party lines, it is not controversial, and it is based on a Parliamentary Report. It is recommended by the Bench, the Bar, the solicitors and the public of Scotland. It was actually mentioned in the Queen's Speech. It has not been introduced by the Government because of shortage of their Parliamentary time. I now hope to find the time myself, as a private Member.
It would implement the recommendations of Cmd. 8144 and would abolish certain archaic laws relating to primogeniture and sex discrimination in succession to property in Scotland, hereditable and movable property. The present law which I seek to alter causes great injustice in Scotland, especially to women. It is, indeed, in many ways antiquated and one would expect that kind of law before the period of the women's sufferage movement in this country.
I shall not trouble the House with an exposition of the law, because it is complex in its history and in its effect, but I shall content myself with one example mentioned to me in a letter from the Law Society of Scotland, which shows in a graphic and touching way the inequity of the present law on intestacy and succession in Scotland. It is this. If a widower dies intestate survived by a son and a daughter leaving a house worth £2,250 and movable estate worth £250 the son will take the house, nine-tenths of the whole estate, while the daughter will take only the movables, one-tenth of the whole estate. That kind of law, in my submission, is unjust, outmoded, and ought to be altered.
It is worthy of remark that both England and Northern Ireland already have reformed their law in this respect. Scotland remains the only part of these islands which retains these archaic and

unjust laws. These laws have been adversely criticised by the Judicature in Scotland, and by the Bar, and, indeed, by everyone else. They were adversely criticised by the Lord Justice General, Lord Cooper, in 1945, by Lord Mackintosh in 1950, and by the Mackintosh Committee itself in 1950, by the Law Society of Scotland, which speaks for the Bar, by the Scottish Law Agents Society, which speaks for the solicitors, and by other authoritative bodies and persons.

Mr. A. C. Manuel: By the Government.

Mr. Hughes: The recommendations on which I rely are authoritative. They are the work of a Government Committee of Inquiry appointed by the Secretary of State for Scotland and presided over by the learned Lord Mackintosh, Senator of the College of Justice of Scotland, and seven other members of that Committee of great erudition and distinction.
The Committee was appointed as far back as 30th July, 1949, nearly twelve years ago. It reported, with great expedition, on 9th December, 1950, about eleven years ago, and, indeed, the Queen's Speech on 27th October, 1959, promised implementation of its recommendations, but that promise has not been fulfilled and I ask for the opportunity of fulfilling it now. These recommendations were based on written and oral evidence from learned and authoritative sources, including the Faculty of Advocates of Scotland, the Law Society of Scotland, the Writers to the Signet in Scotland, the Law Agents Society of Scotland, the Society of Solicitors of the Supreme Court of Scotland, and many other distinguished, learned and authoritative persons.
I shall put the matter briefly by making to the House six submissions. First, the Committee was one of unchallengeable weight, learning and importance, as indeed, I hope I have already proved. The Committee did its work in a manner which was diligent, exhaustive and expeditious and its recommendations have never been challenged. They are worthy of attention. They are sound and practical and they should be embodied in the law of Scotland. Its recommendations are ardently desired by the people and by the legal profession of Scotland.
This reform of the law of intestate succession in Scotland was actually promised in the Queen's Speech, but the promise has not yet been implemented. I feel sure that the Government, who, in response to Questions by me, have given shortage of time as the reason for its not being implemented, will be very grateful to me for finding an opportunity out of my own time to perform this task. This delay of twelve years is not in the interests of the legal system of Scotland and not in the interests of the people of Scotland.
I wish to emphasise the fact that the Committee, in taking oral and written evidence from various learned sources, did not confine itself to the law of Scotland. In its Report, the Committee says that its work involved comparative studies of relevant aspects of the law of England, France, the United States, Germany and Austria. This vast work of erudition and practical utility was undertaken at the public expense in time, labour and money and it is not only a great loss, but morally and politically wrong that the public should be deprived of its consideration by Parliament and its implementation by legislation. It is wrong that the Scots alone should be forced to be the victims of this outmoded system of law which this authoritative Committee has recommended should be amended in the way I have indicated.
The Government, of course, were free to choose their own time. But that the delay is not due to mere forgetfulness is evident from the fact that on 15th December, 1960, the Council of the Scottish Law Agents Society passed unanimously the following short Resolution:
This Council deplores the delay in making Parliamentary time available to introduce legislation based on the recommendations of the Mackintosh Report on intestate succession in Scotland.
Her Majesty's Government did not make time available for the purpose, did not introduce legislation and did not accede to the urgent request of the Scottish Law Agents. I venture to fill the gap by finding out of my own private Member's time an opportunity to do so.
I want to make perfectly clear my authority in this matter. In a letter dated 12th January, 1961, the Scottish Law

Agents Society, representing Scottish solicitors, wrote to me:
The report of the Lord Mackintosh Committee published over nine years ago made recommendations for the modernisation of the law on this subject. It is understood that a Bill is in draft based on these recommendations but there is no prospect of its being introduced this Session. My Council is gravely perturbed at the long delay in giving effect to the Committee's recommendations on this important subject particularly so when an Act has been passed dealing with intestate succession in England, though the Committee under the chairmanship of Lord Morton of Henryton reported later than that under Lord Mackintosh. The reforms desired would remove the injustice and inequity of the present archaic system of law and there should be no technical or controversial difficulty to prevent early reform".
That was the Scottish Law Agents Society, representing Scottish solicitors.
Here is the Society which represents the Bar—the Law Society of Scotland, whose secretary, in a letter to me, writes:
I am instructed by the Council of the Law Society of Scotland respectfully to direct your attention to the position of outstanding Scottish legislation generally and in particular with reference to the law of intestate succession.
This is a long letter and I do not propose to trouble the House with it at any length.
I have put on the Order Paper from time to time several Questions to Her Majesty's Ministers on this subject. On 7th February, the Secretary of State for Scotland gave me a long reply, which ended:
… I see no prospect of legislation to amend the law on intestate succession during the current Session of Parliament."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th February, 1961; Vol. 634. c. 201.]
Here am I, ready to fill the gap. If the Secretary of State cannot find the time I shall try to find the time. I am authoritatively informed that the Scottish Office has a Bill to deal with this problem. I now ask the Scottish Office to give me the Bill and I shall pilot it through. If the Scottish Office will not give me the Bill I shall draft a Bill of my own and pilot it through.
In common justice to jurisprudence, and to Scotland in particular, Her Majesty's Ministers in Scotland should do either one of those two things. The Lord Advocate is quite competent to


pilot the Bill himself. I should be very glad if he took the task off my hands, but I owe a duty to Scotland and to the writers of these letters and I ask the House now in this non-controversial matter to give me liberty to bring in the Bill.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Hector Hughes, Miss Herbison, Mr. Grimond, Mr. Hoy, Mr. Lawson, Mr. Malcolm MacPherson, Mr. Manuel, Mr. Millan, Mr. Oswald, Sir D. Robertson, Mr. G. M. Thomson, and Mr. Willis.

INTESTACY (SCOTLAND) BILL

Bill to amend the law of intestacy in Scotland, presented accordingly and read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday, 21st April, and to be printed. [Bill 109.]

Orders of the Day — CRIMINAL JUSTICE BILL

As amended (in the Standing Committee), further considered.

New Clause.—(RESTRICTION OF SENTENCE OF DEATH.)

In subsection (1) of section fifty-three of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933, as amended by subsection (3) of section nine of the Homicide Act, 1957 (which prohibits the sentence of death on a person under the age of eighteen years), for the words "eighteen years" there shall be substituted the words "twenty-one years".—[Mr. MacColl.]

Question again proposed, That the Clause be read a Second time.

3.49 p.m.

Mr. Victor Yates: I wish to support the Clause. Although we discussed this important matter an Standing Committee, I should like to bring some of the arguments to the House which I think justify making this reform now.
One hon. Member suggested last night that he could not support the Clause unless it included all persons over 21 as well as those under 21. Constitutionally, we have no power to move a Clause of that kind and we cannot suggest it now, but I would point out to the House that in all Bills dealing with children, from the days when a child aged 9, 10, 12, or 14 was hanged for committing not murder but far less severe crimes, at each stage of gradual reform there has been an attempt to increase the minimum age. It was a great tragedy that some years ago, when a similar Amendment was proposed—it was supported by such persons as Lady Astor—this reform was not carried out. It would have saved a great deal of distress and led to a better consideration of the question of crime.
The principal reason why the Clause is not acceptable has been adequately stated, I think, by the Attorney-General. He described the death sentence for those under 21, in the same way as for those over 21, as a unique deterrent. It is that which I wish to challenge, and especially do I challenge it in regard to youth. In the Standing Committee, the Attorney-General said that
… in the present state of society, when the prevalence of serious crime is such a


challenge to the maintenance of law and order, we cannot afford to dispense with what some of us regard as a unique deterrent against the commission of murder, and whose abolition now we believe might lead to the death of many more innocent victims.
He went on to say that
… if the new Clause were carried there would be more innocent victims."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee B, 21st February, 1961; c. 680.]
It is extremely difficult to argue for a Clause like this when crimes of violence have increased, and it is also difficult to argue for it when they have declined. If crimes decline, we are told that it is because we have the deterrent. If they increase, then we are told that we must have the deterrent to prevent a further increase. Every time it is a case of, "Heads I win, tails you lose".
What evidence of the deterrent effect can the Home Secretary give us? It is true that a number of judges and some of the police believe that capital punishment is a deterrent. On a number of occasions such arguments were used before the Royal Commission. But do the judges ever see the persons who are deterred? Surely they see only the persons who are not deterred. Every person who commits a murder and is brought before the court is surely a person who has not been deterred. Consequently, what evidence can the Home Secretary give of persons who have been deterred by capital punishment?
The type of argument used now has been employed at every stage. In 1814, when a youth under the age of 18 was hanged for cutting down a tree and an attempt was made to abolish capital punishment for that offence, the argument used was, "But if you do not hang persons for cutting down trees, you will have them cutting down whole plantations." A child was hanged for stealing 2d. worth of paint, and many others were hanged for stealing articles valued at 5s. The argument always was that capital punishment deterred, but there was no evidence that it did so. In the light of the terrible increase in crimes of violence, which we all deplore, I suggest that there is no evidence that the death sentence is a deterrent.
I believe that the vast majority of persons, especially young persons, who commit the crimes for which this sentence is applicable have disordered minds

or are extremely immature. I would remind hon. Members of the evidence on the immaturity aspect which was given to the Royal Commission by those who advocated that capital punishment should not be imposed upon young persons under 21. I will quote to the House the words which were used in paragraph 197, and I submit that these findings were drafted not by lawyers but by medical persons and others of an entirely different character from police or lawyers.
The paragraph said:
In almost all young people under the age of 21 the process of mental and emotional development is still active, and is liable to produce a condition of instability—that is, a condition in which the strength of an individual's reactions is out of proportion to the strength of the stimulus. Sometimes this instability is so pronounced as to produce ' a recognised mental disorder'. Such cases are exceptional, but it is common knowledge that most young people aged 18, 19 or 20 are liable to have emotional reactions out of proportion to the events which occasion them Their judgment is liable to be distorted and their self-control to be insecure, because those reactions are more explosive and less controllable than they are likely to be when the more active stage of emotional development has passed.
I submit that that is very sound evidence for considering the Clause.

Commander J. S. Kerans: Surely the hon. Gentleman would agree that at 18 the majority of youths should certainly know the difference between right and wrong and appreciate what they are about to do in crimes of violence.

Mr. Yates: The evidence which we are now considering does not seem to indicate that. An hon. Member argued yesterday that that might be so at 14, 15 or 16. It is extremely difficult; some persons are more mature than others. However, I should not like to make the distinction. I think that in respect of the range from 18 to 21 we should consider again whether we could not be more objective about this matter.
The second reason why I am very loath to continue the hanging of young persons is that the death sentence is irrevocable. I believe that it is still possible for innocent persons to be hanged. I will not go into that, because it might involve many more considerations.
The hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) raised in Committee the question of alternative punishment. I am sorry that he is not here at the moment. It was an important question. He argued that a sentence of twenty to twenty-five years' imprisonment might be a deterrent. But, of course, we already have long sentences for those who are under the age of 18, and I submit that the important consideration is whether the individual who has been considered to be immature has been able to be so corrected that society need not, in the future, be protected from him.
4.0 p.m.
I think of young persons of 19 or 20 who have been sentenced to life imprisonment. I have seen some of them in prison. I saw one young man in Wake-field Gaol, and I was staggered, having asked him what his sentence was, when he replied, "I am here for life". I do not think that over ten to fifteen years he will not have been sufficiently corrected. The important consideration is whether or not society is safeguarded from future actions similar to those which an individual originally carried out and Which led to his imprisonment.
A few months ago I visited Broad-moor. I was extremely surprised to learn from the medical superintendent that, since Broadmoor began, not one of the insane murderers who had eventually been corrected and released—and there has been a considerable number of them—has ever committed a crime again. I am certain that the Home Secretary will agree that before a person is released the Home Secretary must feel a reasonable assurance that he has been corrected and will not return to a life of crime. That is a very important consideration, especially for young persons, whom we are now considering.
I cannot see the value in a youth of 20 being sentenced to twenty-five years' imprisonment. In any case, I do not believe that long sentences are the solution in this country, any more than they are a solution in the United States where they are, indeed, much longer.

Vice-Admiral John Hughes Hallett: It was I who raised the question of the length of the sentence yesterday. Obviously, on many occasions a murder by a young person

is likely to be his only offence, but if the hon. Member pursues his line of argument one might ask, why punish the person involved at all?

Mr. Yates: If an individual commits murder, whether it is his only offence or not—

Mr. Sydney Silverman: Why not hang them all?

Mr. Yates: —he must be dealt with.
I was referring to the argument of the hon. Member for Ashford who, in Committee upstairs, argued about an alternative. The hon. Member for Croydon, North-East (Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett) may ask the same question as his hon. Friend the Member for Ashford—that is to say, if one cannot think of a suitable alternative, then what does one do? Does one kill them all? Is that the solution? I do not think that it is. Especially do I not think that it is a solution to the problem of youth and the immaturity of youth.
If we are to be stuck on the question of an alternative punishment, then we shall be led into many arguments which have been used in the past, always against reform, always against a change in the law. Indeed, in 1834 the Duke of Richmond, when asked to consider abolishing capital punishment for stealing letters, said:
Their lordships ought not to abolish capital punishment for stealing letters until some good mode of secondary punishment has been adopted.
There is only one solution to the problem. The chief deterrent to crime is not barbarous punishment, but the certainty of conviction. The Home Secretary referred yesterday to the importance of the police. Brutal punishment accustoms people to brutality and tends to increase crimes of violence. Violence breeds violence. It was once said:
The right of means to do ill deeds means ill deeds done.

Sir Thomas Moore (Ayr): Who starts the violence?

Mr. Yates: I say that violence breeds violence. If violence is wrong for an individual, then it is equally wrong that the State should use violence. The hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) must have realised that the Christian purpose is redemptive. Christianity asserts that


the human personality is of infinite value in the sight of God, and that no one is beyond the reach of spiritual reclamation. However evil or depraved a boy or girl might be, the Christian aim in punishment must be reformation.
We will never deter young persons, however brutal their crimes, by holding the gallows in front of them. There must be a better and more constructive way. I still believe in what John Bright once said:
A deep reverence for human life is worth more than 1,000 executions in the prevention of murder. It is, in fact, the great security of human life. The law of capital punishment, whilst pretending to support this reverence, does, in fact, tend to destroy it.
I ask other hon. Members to support this Clause and so allow us to have another movement of reform. However much we may desire capital punishment to be abolished altogether we have no power to propose it now, but we should try to obtain at least this reform and thereby abolish capital punishment for murder by people up to the age of 21. Having abolished it, I do not believe that we should ever go back to it.

Mr. Peter Rawlinson: I am glad that the House has had the opportunity of debating this important issue at some length. It would have given a wrong impression if that had not been the case, in view of the fact that so much time was spent yesterday in discussing what many people regard as a minor issue.
This is an issue on which most people on both sides of the House have already adopted an attitude or a conviction to which they will hold, no matter what arguments are advanced for or against this proposal. Those convictions are held sincerely, and it is no help to intervene from a sitting position, as I feel that I was almost guilty at one moment of intervening during the argument that the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. V. Yates) was adducing. I know how sincerely he holds the views that he puts.
The hon. Member's views about reverence for human life are shared by all who seriously consider this matter and the opinion they are to hold about capital punishment. The partisans on either side of the House do their own cases irremediable harm by the kind of jeers which sometimes pass from one side to

the other. This is a matter on which everybody has very serious convictions.
Arguments about what happened in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, which have been used to show how wrong the judges then were to refuse to abolish capital punishment for stealing sheep or forgery or whatever it may have been, do not apply in modern conditions and modern life. They operated in a primitive society when there was no regular police force and society demanded that there should be those tremendous punishments for crime which no one would think of imposing in our present society with a modern police force and with our present organised communities. The argument which harks back to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries does not assist us in our conclusions about these matters in the twentieth century.
Why should the proposal in the Clause be limited to the age of 21? Why should it not be 24 or 25? Those who are supporting the Clause do so in the belief that capital punishment as such is infamous and they feel that any form of reduction of it would be very much to the better.

Mr. David Weitzman: Why not 18?

Mr. Rawlinson: I think that it should be 18, because in view of the state of maturity which persons of that age achieve nowadays they are able to distinguish between right and wrong. Of course, there must be an arbitrary limit at some age, because the line has to be drawn somewhere. One has to decide the age at which a person must appreciate the importance of the crime he is committing and its dreadful nature and must understand that society says that if he commits it, if he deliberately determines to kill someone, then society will mark that crime for this penalty.
Even since the days of the Royal Commission, when Mr. Gerald Gardiner referred to people of 18 not being able to sign a will, and so on, there has been a remarkable change in the maturity of the younger generation in these matters. It is wrong to say that someone of 18 does not know what it means to get a gun, not only to get a gun but to load it, to put it in his pocket and later to shoot someone with it. He knows what


he is doing. I have never believed that there should be capital punishment for what is known as a crime passionel—a person acting on something which drives him beyond what is ordinarily called judgment. But the man who gets a gun, who buys a gum and puts it in his pocket, who deliberately loads it before committing an offence, is the kind of man who can and should be deterred.

Mr. W. T. Proctor: Does the hon. and learned Member consider that 18 would be an appropriate age for someone to have the vote?

Mr. Rawlinson: The hon. Member makes a debating point. It may be that someone of 18 would find it difficult to decide whether to vote for the hon. Member or me, but he has no difficulty in knowing that it is not right to take a gun and to load it and to fire it and to kill someone. We have to decide what is the proper age, and I think that the right age is 18.
This is a grave responsibility and we have a unique generation, a generation which has upon it influences which other generations probably did not have, influences coming after the holocausts of the last war. We have to say that murder is a unique crime and that society must demand for it a unique and terrible punishment and I believe that the age should be maintained at 18, and I ask the House to reject the Clause.

4.15 p.m.

Mr. S. Silverman: I begin by agreeing with the hon. and learned Member for Epsom (Mr. Rawlinson) that no advantage arises from under-valuing either the sincerity or force of the arguments on either side. If we are to reach any kind of sane and sound solution to the problem with which we are all concerned, we do very much better to examine the arguments on their merits to the best of our conscientious judgment and ability, standing by the conclusions which we form in that way.
Therefore, before coming to the merits of the argument, I address two personal appeals. It is not much use saying that we ought to reach a conclusion according to the merits of the argument as we ultimately come to see those merits if, at the end of the argument, we cast our votes not in accordance with the judgment which we have brought to bear and

with the opinions with which we have conscientiously formed, but against that opinion because it is politically convenient to the Government, or to the Whips, or to anybody else, or for any other reason.
Our practice, not invariably but for the most part, has been that the House has accepted that principle on this issue. Whenever it has done so, it has come down on the side of those who think that this penalty ought no longer to continue. But, irrespective of the conclusion it has formed, until the Homicide Act, we have always thought that this was a question which Members of Parliament ought to be entitled and ought to accept as an obligation to decide according to their judgments and consciences.
Yesterday, 69 hon. Members opposite, whose general loyalty is pledged to the Government, voted against the Government on an issue of penal reform which everyone will recognise to be, however important in itself, less important than this. During the days of the Death Penalty (Abolition) Bill, I gratefully acknowledged then, and I repeat my acknowledgment now, the help of hon. Members opposite without whose support we could not have achieved the successes which we then had.
Those hon. Members showed considerable courage and integrity in doing so—I say that without any depreciation of the courage and integrity of the others—but they did so in circumstances in which the Government had agreed not merely that they should do it, but to accept the decision of the House of Commons—not of any other House—as registered by the free exercise of the honest and conscientious judgment of every hon. Member, without regard to party affiliations or other political loyalties of any kind. They did not do that when the Whips were ultimately put on.
Those 69 hon. Members who, yesterday, voted against the Government, and against me—I did not agree with them and I thought that they were wholly wrong in their judgment and in the opinion which they had formed—were wholly right, on an issue of that kind, to express their views as they did and to go on record in support of those things in which they passionately and conscientiously believed.
Is it too much to ask those who, in their hearts and consciences, agree with the new Clause to show the same independence, the same courage, and the same conscientious loyalty to their honest judgments and opinions as was shown by the 69 hon. Members yesterday on the other issue? I know, or, at least, I believe, because I cannot know, that if they did this Clause would be carried.
I know that this is a fine-drawn argument. The recommendation in favour of it was carried in the Royal Commission by a single vote. The Clause was lost in Committee upstairs by a single vote, and the votes against it included the vote of an hon. Member who is a member of the National Executive Committee of the Campaign for the Abolition of Capital Punishment. I am not blaming him. I gather from hon. Members that the hon. Member did not vote against the Clause, but only abstained from voting. If that is right, my comment must be modified to that extent, but in any case I am not blaming him or offering any kind of criticism or censure. I am saying only that on this issue, whatever one believes on other issues, one ought to cast one's vote as one thinks it ought to be cast. My appeal is to those who think we are right on this point to vote with us, whatever the Government may wish them to do.
My second appeal is directed to the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary.

Mr. Raymond Gower: The hon Gentleman mentioned the voting on the Death Penalty (Abolition) Bill. He will recall that while some hon. Members on this side of the House voted for a Second Reading of the Bill they then sought to amend the Bill in a certain specified way which, ultimately, was not very different from the formula embodied in the present law under the subsequent Act.

Mr. Silverman: If the hon. Gentleman means that there have always been some hon. Members who do not agree with me, I recognise that. That has always been so.
My second personal appeal is to the Home Secretary. I hope that he will not think it an impertinence if I say that I know where his sympathies are. I think

that if he took the Whips off himself he would vote for the new Clause. He can deny that if he wishes, or if he thinks it is not right to express that opinion that is for him to say. I am expressing my belief that, but for political considerations of another kind, his sympathies would be with those of us who say that if we must retain this penalty at all then 18 is too young. If I am wrong about that, the rest of my appeal is not worth making and I will not make it.
If I am right about that, I beg him not to hang any more children between the ages of 18 and 21. If he thinks it right to do it, then go ahead and do it by all means, but if, in his heart, he believes that it is wrong, I ask him to show the same steadfast courage and integrity which he showed yesterday in resisting what must have been very strong pressure and a great temptation. He did not yield then, and I suggest to him that he ought to seize this occasion of further modifying the law which he took the initiative in modifying in 1958 in the light of the experience we have had since then.

Mr. Godfrey Lagden: The hon. Gentleman said how much he admired the 69 hon. Members who yesterday voted according to their consciences. Why should he assume that the same 69 hon. Members, or others on this side of the House who feel now as he feels over this question, will not have the courage to act in the same manner? Also, why does he think that he can impute to the Leader of the House a less conscientious attitude in the exercise of his vote than the 69 hon. Members who voted yesterday?

Mr. Silverman: As to the second point, I hope that I said the contrary. On the first point, I made no assumption. If I made the assumption which the hon. Gentleman imputes to me, I would not have wasted the time of the House in making the appeal I did. I hope that those who agree with me about this will show the same courage and intellectual integrity which was shown by the hon. Gentleman when he voted against his Whips yesterday. Of course, those who do not agree will be displaying the same courage. My appeal is directed not to those who do not agree with me. I know how they will vote. My appeal is


directed to those hon. Members who agree with me, and I ask them to do what the 69 hon. Members did yesterday.
Now I come to the merits. We are not concerned with the general merits of the death penalty. We are to assume that the death penalty for some people and for some purposes remains, and we have to consider this new Clause against that background. What is it we are proposing to do? We must take into account the state of the law which it is proposed to apply to young people between the ages of 18 and 21, and it is not a satisfactory law. It is not a good law. I do not think that there is a solitary hon. Member who thinks that the state of the law with regard to murder as set out in the Homicide Act, 1958, and in the light of the experience that we have had, is satisfactory.

Mr. Ray Mawby: May I make the position clear? Many hon. Members on this side of the House do not feel that it is a satisfactory position because the hon. Gentleman started the whole problem by making the position what it is at the moment, where it is neither one thing nor the other.

Mr. Silverman: I hope that hon. Members will not prolong the debate by making interventions which are not in issue and which are not challenged. All I said was that there was no hon. Member who regarded the present position as satisfactory, and the hon. Gentleman agrees with me. It was not necessary to intervene to say that he agreed. If he did not agree there would be some purpose in the intervention. The state of the law is entirely unsatisfactory, and no hon. Member thinks otherwise.
Let me give one example, and it applies to this age group with which we are concerned in the new Clause. Consider the recent case of Riley, who was not quite 21. I will not at this moment say anything which was disputed by the prosecution. As everyone knows, many things are disputed. In that case this young man, with no record of stealing or dishonesty, was in a police station, having spent most of the previous evening until the early hours of the morning on a "pub crawl".
Riley was charged with murder. There came a moment—how it came I

will not discuss—when he indicated to the detective-sergeant in whose charge he was that he wanted to make a confession. He said, "Sergeant, what is capital murder?" The sergeant said, "It is killing a policeman or a prison warder." Riley asked him, "Does it include breaking in?" The answer was, "It might." There was one pertinent thing that the officer knew, namely, that it included killing in the course of theft, but he did not tell Riley that, and when asked subsequently, in cross-examination, "Why did not you tell him that?" he answered, "I told him what I thought it was fit for him to know."
4.30 p.m.
Riley was 20 years old. Believing, in his innocence, that the officer had given him all the relevant information, he proceeded to make a statement, and he no doubt made that statement trying to make out the best case he could for himself. No one can blame him for that, whatever he had done. Trying to make the best case he could, he said, "I only wanted some money." He thought that that was an excuse. He was saying, "I had no malicious intention to kill. I did not mean to do any serious harm, or any serious damage. I only wanted some money. That is my excuse." He did not know, and the police officer did not tell him, that that was fatal.
If he had said, "I went into that house full of hate. I went in determined to kill somebody. I went in determined to find this old woman and rape and kill her in order to satisfy my grudge against society. I did not want any money; I wanted to kill", it would not have been a capital crime, and he would be alive today. That is the effect of the Homicide Act. Is there any sense in it?

Mr. Geoffrey Wilson: Yes.

Mr. Silverman: In the case of this young man, under 21 years of age, would it not have been better to say, "The death penalty shall not apply to you"? When we consider the age at which a penalty of this kind shall be inflicted we must consider the state of the law, the kind of penalty we are inflicting, and the kind of reason for which it is being inflicted. While the law is as unsatisfactory as it now is, it seems to me that we have an extremely good reason for keeping down the age limit.

Mr. G. Wilson: Is not the example which the hon. Member has given a vindication of the present state of the law, in that, on his own statement, if this man had thought there was a death penalty he would have been deterred? I agree that there is no evidence that a man who is so crazy that he wants to kill would be deterred by knowing that there was a death penalty.

Mr. Silverman: If the hon. Member is of the opinion that it is not right to take the life of a man who kills on purpose and without any kind of motive or excuse, but that it is right to take the life of somebody who had no such intention, and who killed, to some extent, by accident, without intending to do so at all, he is entitled to his opinion—but I should imagine that he is alone in it.

Mr. Gower: Is it not much more likely that a man's entry would result in killing if he went in to steal? Is it not less likely that a person would go in having decided just to kill?

Mr. Silverman: I do not want to go into all these abstruse psychological arguments. If the hon. Member gets any satisfaction out of them he must get as much as he can, but for me our execution of Riley, who did not intend to kill, and our saying that we would not have executed him if he had intended to kill, is a monstrosity, and I find it difficult to believe that anyone can come to any other conclusion.
It is granted that there must be some age limit, however arbitrary, below which we should not inflict this penalty. The present law says that that age limit shall be 18. Under the Clause it would be 21. I would point out to the right hon. Gentleman that to keep the age of 18 as the minimum age for the death penalty is inconsistent with the whole scheme of his Bill. Let us consider Clause 4. The main claim to be made for the Bill—and it is a sound claim—and the main improvement it makes in our present penal code, is its removal for a further time of the danger of the penalty of imprisonment for certain offences.
The Home Secretary thinks—and he is right to think—that that is a good thing to do when we are considering whether a man should go to gaol or to a detention

centre. In considering whether his offences are such that he should go to prison, or are such that we should take some further opportunity of keeping him out of prison, what does Clause 4 say about the age limit which should be chosen? It says:
In any case where a court has power, or would have power but for the statutory restrictions upon the imprisonment of young offenders, to pass sentence of imprisonment on an offender under twenty-one but not less than fourteen years of age, the court may, subject to the provisions of this section, order him to be detained in a detention centre.
It provides that between the ages of 14 and 21 the court may have this power. How can we reconcile the choice of a limit of 21 as the age below which imprisonment ought not to be imposed, unless there are special circumstances, with the retention of the gallows and the hangman at the age of 18?
A person cannot vote at the age of 18. He cannot take any share whatever in framing the law; he cannot exercise any influence upon, or make any choice about, the laws to which he is subject until he has reached the age of 21. But the final penalty—the irrevocable penalty—is exacted from him three years before that. Can that be right? If, at the age of 18, 19, 20, or 20 years, 11 months and 29 days, a person contracts a debt in respect of a motor car, or a motor cycle, or a packet of cigarettes—none of them a necessity—he cannot be made to pay. If he is sued in a county court for a debt—it may be as little as 5s., or as much as £500, or any other figure—he is not liable; the court regards him as an infant, and will not give the creditor his money or give judgment against the debtor, because he is too young to be responsible.
But if he kills somebody, perhaps without meaning to, in the present state of the law—which makes the question whether or not the death penalty is exacted a personal decision of the Home Secretary, uncontrolled, and without appeal—he is liable to die. Does the House think that that is right? When we had conscription, a man was taken into the Army and made liable, and one of the arguments used for raising the age for conscription to 21 was the argument that I am using now. I agree that it was rejected, but that is the only exception, and in all those other respects the law holds—and it is a matter of common


law—that one cannot be liable for one's debts until one is 21. But one is liable to hang. It cannot be right. It is not rational; it is not just; it cannot really be supported.
Why do we cling so obstinately to it? This is the death penalty that we are talking about, and we cannot change it once we have executed it. One of the great arguments against the death penalty is that if it should happen that we make a mistake we can do nothing to put it right, and we give the Establishment an interest in going on pretending, in the teeth of all the evidence, that a mistake has not been made.

Mr. Leslie Hale: May I remind my hon. Friend that there was the case of William Habron, who, in 1876, when a lad of 18, was reprieved, having been convicted of the murder of a policeman, solely on account of his youth? Three or four years later his innocence was recognised.

Mr. Silverman: I am much obliged to my hon. Friend. He was reprieved, but if he had not been, nothing could be done about it. When he was reprieved, or even if he had served the full sentence, after eight, nine, ten or eleven years, he would still be a young, redeemable human being when he came out, but there it is. That is one of the principal arguments against retaining it at all, but what is its application to this much narrower point? Is it not this?
If we can justify the death penalty at all—I think that we cannot, but if we can—then we can justify it only in cases where the life is so patently valueless and irredeemable that we are really doing no violence to the principle of the sanctity of human life, on which this argument ultimately depends. Is there any hon. Member in the House who is prepared to say that at the age of 18 somebody is irredeemable? I am not prepared to say that for any age. I do not know whether I am irredeemable or not, but I hesitate to give up hope. Can we say that at the age of 18 a life is so utterly vile, vicious and valueless that we can take it away without a qualm and without hesitation? I do not think that anybody listening to me in this Chamber now thinks that we can. Let us, therefore, at least take this

opportunity of bringing the lower limit for the execution of the death penalty into line with the practice of the county courts in cases of trivial debt.
4.45 p.m.
One final point. I had a word or two to say last night about the generation with which we are now dealing in 1961. Twenty-one years ago it was 1940. The generation with which we are concerned in this new Clause, as I said last night, has been more betrayed, more damaged, more injured and more destroyed by generations for whom they were not responsible, and by conditions in the world which they did not create and could not alter, than any other generation in our history.
It is so easy to sit in judgment. Have we any right to do so? If they sat in judgment on us, would our generation be confident of acquittal? The conditions in which they grew up were not such as to conduce to a balanced, sane evaluation of civic responsibilities and the value of human life. We have not given young people these conditions any time in this century. Twenty million lives were lost in the First World War and 30 million in the Second World War, and the people who are defending the death penalty because they are horrified about the murder of a single individual are prepared—I do not say without qualms, but still are prepared—at the end of the day to use weapons which could destroy the whole of the human race. In a world so insecure, in a world so fraught with terror, in a world in which the outlook is so doubtful and obscure, let us beware how we sit in such irrevocable and unalterable judgment as to take the lives of young people at so early an age as this.
Let the House of Commons have courage. There are not many people whom we execute now—three, four or perhaps five a year—and if we take out of that number those who would otherwise be executed between the ages of 18 and 21, will we really be altering the pattern of social behaviour in this country? Will it suddenly become intolerable or unbearable? Will the risk increase so much? Let us rather say that at the age of 18 there is no life so valueless or so beyond redemption that we have the right to take it away.

The Clerk at the Table informed the House of the unavoidable absence of Mr. SPEAKER from the remainder of this day's Sitting.

Whereupon Sir GORDON TOUCHE, The CHAIRMAN OF WAYS AND MEANS, took the Chair as DEPUTY-SPEAKER, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Sir Henry d'Avigdor-Goldsmid: Not having been present in the Chamber last evening, I would deem it to be intensely discourteous if I were to speak more than briefly today, but there are a few things that I must say in addressing myself to this new Clause, which proposes the raising of the age limit for the death penalty from 18 to 21.
I was amongst the minority of hon. Members on this side of the House who supported the abolition of the death penalty and also voted for the Homicide Bill. In voting for that Bill, I took the view that we should see how it worked out, and that our duty as defenders of the public demanded that we should give to the Executive the five years they asked for to see how it worked out. Now, these five years are coming to an end, and we can see how it is working out.
I would say that, in respect of the new Clause we are now considering, the Homicide Bill was wrong. I would say quite definitely that experience of the last five years with regard to the young offender between the ages of 18 and 21, has shown that the infliction of the death penalty has not been justified. I must be very careful to watch my words. We have talked a great deal about deterrence. Deterrence simply cannot be measured. This argument has been used on both sides of the House, but if nothing is done the reason for not doing it cannot be ascertained.
I am going to advance the argument, which I firmly believe, that in a few exceptional cases, the death penalty is a positive attraction. My convinced view is that in the case of these unstable, ruthless, feckless men who have committed these shocking crimes which are an affront to our civilisation and which assault all our decent feelings, the existence of the death penalty at the end of the road is an added glamour. Where we get young people whose home life is perhaps non-existent, whose upbringing

has been greatly neglected, there is a glamour which can be found in crime.
Instead of feeling, as they should, when committing these shocking, disgusting, filthy assaults and being looked upon as suffering from a foul disease which is the contempt of our society, they see themselves glamourised. They see from the attention they get in the Press, from the attention they get everywhere and the interested curiosity they evoke their exhibitionist feelings are satisfied. I cannot bring myself to think that if the death penalty for these offenders—I use the word advisedly—these disgusting, revolting, offenders were replaced by a long spell of incarceration that they would feel they were acting in a dashing, glorious, glamorous manner in murdering unoffending old gentlemen. I believe that it is the death penalty in those cases which has led to one or two recent crimes.
I do not belong to any campaign. I have not lent my name to the support of any cause on this matter, but I am clear in my mind that if we are interested in the defence of the public, as we are, the public interest will best be defended by letting these overgrown urchins be treated as the adolescents and irresponsible creatures that they are. Let society not give them the treatment of adults. They have done nothing to deserve it. I say this in no sympathy, but simply only in my feelings that the public's interest comes first. I believe that just as in war the man in the Services faces bullets bravely, he would face with much less valour the prospect of a long, lingering, miserable, and disgraceful incarceration. What is true of the best in war is true also of the worst in peace.
These young offenders to whom exhibitionism has become a part of their lives are encouraged in that by the glamour of a death penalty which awaits them when they are caught. They have the excitement of planning the crime. There is the police chase, the world of publicity turned on to them and the exhibitionism we have read about. If, instead of the death penalty being the final punishment, they were treated as hopeless, irresponsible children, who have to be kept away, kept out and kept in the corner, I believe that there would be far less inducement to young men to commit these crimes. They certainly


would not be the admiration of nor fascinate their followers, male or female.
Some hon. Members have said that because the Clause does not go the whole way in abolishing the death penalty they will not support it. I am absolutely open-minded on that subject. I know where my responsibility and duty leads me and I believe that I am not alone among hon. Members on this side of the House when I say that with full consciousness of my responsibility to the public, to my electors and to those whose safety must be my prime concern, I shall vote for the Clause.

Mr. Weitzman: The arguments for and against abolition of capital punishment have been put again and again. I do not suppose for a moment that I can convince anyone by trying to repeat them. I desire only to deal with one point which I raised in Committee upstairs, when the matter was dealt with there.
My hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) touched upon it in the very powerful speech he made today. Earlier, I interrupted the hon. and learned Member for Epsom (Mr. Rawlinson) to ask him why the age of 18 was fixed. The answer he gave was that he supposed we had to take some age and that 18 was the age at which, apparently, it was recognised people were mature. As my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne pointed out, taking the age of 18 is in conflict with the whole scheme of the Bill. As he pointed out and as I pointed out earlier, Clause 4 deals with the age of 21. The whole idea of the Bill is to take the age of 21 and to recognise that those under that age ought to be dealt with in a special way.
If the hon. and learned Member is right, and if it is true that young people of 18 are mature and ought to be dealt with in the same way as adults, they ought to be sent to prison in the same way as adults. Yet the Home Secretary himself has recognised the distinction. It is not fallacious to say that the whole concept of our law recognises that distinction. It has been pointed out again and again that under the age of 21 persons are, in law, infants. I do not know why the age of 18 was fixed as the age below which persons should not hang. The definition of a young person

is one below 17. Why not take the age of 17? Yet in some extraordinary way the age of 18 has been taken.
It has been pointed out that the Select Committee, as long ago as 1930, recommended that the death penalty should be abolished for persons under the age of 21. It did so on a wealth of evidence put before it. Medical evidence was produced before it that people under the age of 21 were immature and emotionally unstable. When that argument was put forward, the Attorney-General answered it by saying that if there is a case of a person who is unstable or immature the Home Secretary can exercise the prerogative. The point is that it is not simply one case, but there is a wealth of medical opinion that as a class persons under 21 are immature and emotionally unstable compared with adults. Therefore, they ought to be dealt with in a different way.
Clearly, immaturity and emotional instability are factors which count to a tremendous extent when we are considering the crime of murder. The hon. and learned Member for Epsom has considerable experience, as a number of us have, in dealing with cases of murder by persons under 21. The hon. and learned Member must know from experience, as many of us know, how very different persons under the age of 21 are in regard to the commission of this crime.
I am making only a short contribution to the debate, although I feel strongly about the matter and would have been ready to put forward and support the arguments in favour of the abolition of capital punishment for all. I want, however, to emphasise this point. By this Bill, the Home Secretary has brought forward a great Measure. It is one that will do a great deal of good. It recognises that fundamentally persons under the age of 21 should be dealt with in a different way.

5.0 p.m.

Mr. Hale: When my hon. and learned Friend talks about persons being immature, may I remind him that Derek Bentley, who went to the scaffold at the age of 19, was discharged from the Armed Forces as a fourth-grade mental defective and suffered from epilepsy petit mal?

Mr. Weitzman: I am obliged.
I emphasise, finally, the point which I am making. I want to put it as strongly as I can. I recognise that the Bill is an important Measure, dealing with young persons under the age of 21. The Home Secretary himself has recognised that in the provision which is made in Clause 4, in particular, and in other Clauses. If it is right to enact that persons under 21 shall not be sent to prison and special conditions shall apply to them, surely it is right to accept the new Clause.
I urge the Home Secretary to recognise that here is an opportunity of putting into effect an important reform. It does not, unfortunately—because it cannot, to be in order—go the whole way in regard to the abolition of capital punishment, but it is an important step forward. Bearing in mind the criticism so rightly made of the provisions of the Homicide Act, and remembering that this new Clause will fit into the scheme of the Bill, I ask the Home Secretary to accept it and to go at least some way towards the achievement of complete abolition.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. R. A. Butler): I undertook last night, in answer to requests, that we should not take a decision on this Clause at a late hour of the night because of the nature of the subject which we have to decide. I hope now that we shall be able to come to a decision, because we have had well over three hours' debate on this matter, including the time taken both last night and today, and a number of important speeches have been made. We should, I think, be ready to come to a decision. Then, we can proceed with the rest of the Bill.
I have followed the debate from start to finish. It was opened by the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) with a thoughtful speech which brought home to all of us what a serious subject this is. The hon. Member was followed by the hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), who sent me a note to say that he is not able to be in the House today. The hon. and learned Member warned me that he would "gun" for me, but in the end I found his speech enjoyable, as, indeed, I found all the speeches yesterday, from all sides of the House, equally enjoyable.
However, the hon. and learned Member brought into his speech a great deal of deep sentiment. He quoted the early life of St. Augustine and pointed out that from a bad start he had become one of the greatest figures in all the history of civilisation and thought. Speeches of that sort add greatly to our debates. Taking, also, the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes), when he drew attention to the possible alternatives to the Clause, it can be said that we have had what may be described as a thoughtful and constructive debate.
The new Clause proposes to substitute the words "twenty-one years" for "eighteen years" in Section 9 (3) of the Homicide Act, 1957, which, in turn, amended Section 53 of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933. We are not, therefore, dealing with the whole question of capital punishment, but simply with the new Clause, which seeks to raise the age at which capital punishment should be a penalty under the Homicide Act. This has been brought out clearly by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Hobson) and by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Epsom (Mr. Rawlinson). My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Epsom put very succinctly the reasons why he could not accept the Clause, and I should like to be brief myself.
It has been found that this was a natural subject for debate on Report owing to the fact that the decision in Committee was extremely close, the majority being only one vote. I remind the House that this was also a subject which was debated at great length by the Royal Commission on Capital Punishment, whose members were themselves divided and also agreed their decision by a majority of only one.

Mr. S. Silverman: The other way.

Mr. Butler: Yes, the other way. The argument of the Royal Commission is set out in paragraphs 188 onwards of its Report. It could not, therefore, by any stretch of the imagination be described as an easy matter and I will try and give the House shortly the reasons why the Government cannot accept the Clause.
The first reason is that the Government remain of the opinion that it is too


soon to draw conclusions about the result of the Homicide Act, 1957. It has been said in the debate, and it can be repeated, that that Act is easy to criticise. It defines certain categories of murder and leaves out others. It was the result of intense pulling of consciences and straining of thought in this House a few years ago under my predecessor, who was then Home Secretary. It certainly imposes an extremely heavy burden on anyone who has to administer it. I should like to make that quite clear, because we are not discussing that major issue today. It was, however, a major issue before the House.
Quite apart from the fact that the Government have decided and announced that they want sufficient time in which to see the operation of the Homicide Act, I doubt whether opinion has crystalised sufficiently yet in the Commons to know how Parliament would vote in the event of a decision being taken as to whether we should reimpose all types of murder as being capitally punishable, or whether we should abolish the death penalty. Certainly, some of the speeches made in the debate today with great sincerity by my hon. Friends and others lead me to doubt whether anybody can foresee what would happen.

Mr. S. Silverman: When the Home Secretary says that he does not know what the result would be if the House had to consider the question again, does he mean considering it again with the Whips on or with the Whips off? If he means with the Whips off, I would welcome the opportunity of trying.

Mr. Butler: I am not giving a decision on that because, there is no Government policy in this respect at the moment, I having stated clearly that the Government's policy is to give the Act time to work out. The original suggestion was a five-year period. I do not think that any Government worthy of its name which did not give a lead on this matter next time would be worthy of consideration. It would be necessary in the general state of concern and, in some cases, indecision, to give a lead of what we thought.
The general amendment of the Act does not come into question. What comes into question is whether we should

amend it in this respect. I do not like to use the word "piecemeal", which gives the impression that the new Clause is light-hearted, which it certainly is not, but what comes into question is whether to amend the Act in part in relation to the age. I do not believe that all abolitionists support this amendment.
It so happens that my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South (Sir H. d'Avigdor-Goldsmid) has said that he supports it, but my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesend (Mr. Kirk) said that in this matter he would prefer to abstain. The hon. Member for Chesterfield (Sir G. Benson), who took and takes a strong view on abolition generally, did not seem very pleased that a partial amendment only should be brought forward by his party on this occasion. There is, therefore, a general view—

Sir George Benson: I hope that the right hon. Gentleman is not suggesting that I am satisfied even with the age of 21. I was merely pointing out that that was all that could be done under the Bill.

Mr. Butler: I certainly followed the arguments of the hon. Member, who contributes so much to our discussions in these matters. I was pointing out that he did not find it very satisfactory to try to deal with the question of the Homicide Act in a partial manner, even though I quite agree that under the Bill anything else would be out of order and this is as far as we can go under the Bill.
As my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General said in Committee—and he was not answered in Committee; if there is an answer, I should be glad to hear it—I doubt whether the supporters of the new Clause have the strong support of the Society for the Abolition of Capital Punishment in this partial move that they are making. It is a partial move.

Mr. James MacColl: I should not like the right hon. Gentleman to think that I moved the Clause in any way as a representative of an organisation. I did it as an individual Member of the House, expressing my views on the matter. As for the distinction the right hon. Gentleman drew between altering the age and total abolition, the Royal Commission was allowed to consider the question of altering the age, but was not


allowed to consider the question of total abolition. The Royal Commission expressed its view by a majority in favour of altering the age. It therefore seems reasonable that the House should take that into consideration rather than the general issue.

Mr. Butler: I accept that, but it does not counter anything I was saying. I was saying that the Government do not think it is a suitable moment to make a partial amendment of the 1957 Act.

Mr. S. Silverman: Will the Home Secretary allow me to answer, at least partially—I cannot answer in full—a question he just asked? I am a member of the National Executive of the Campaign for the Abolition of Capital Punishment. I do not know that it has ever expressly considered this question, but I certainly have no reason whatever to think that it would not welcome any amelioration of the death penalty, any abolition of part of it, until the day comes when it can be totally abolished.

Mr. Butler: I made my observations with a view to trying to find out. Therefore, I accept what the hon. Gentleman has said. It was raised by the Attorney-General in Committee. He asked whether anybody could give him an answer. As I have read all the debates in Committee with great assiduity, as I am sure that the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) would like to hear, I wanted to have an answer to the question.
That is our first reason as a Government for resisting the new Clause. Our second reason is the same as that which had much influence on the Report of the Royal Commission, namely, the state of crime. While I do not want to go into great detail after our debates yesterday, I must remind the House of the state of crime at present. The number of persons aged between 17 and 21 found guilty of crimes of violence against the person has continued to increase, from 1,635 in 1957, to 2,084 in 1958 and to 2,366 in 1959, which is the latest year for which we have figures.
The number of cases of robbery, which in most cases involved some form of violence, has also increased. In 1959, the number of persons in this age group convicted of this offence was about one-quarter of the total number convicted. It is reasonable to assume

that the same age group was responsible for a similar proportion of the offences not cleared up.
It therefore appears to the Government that this is not a situation in which we can make a change, especially a partial change. This was the same attitude which was adopted by some members of the Royal Commission when they said in 1953 that the great increase in violent crime committed by persons aged between 17 and 21 did not at that time appear to have passed its peak, and that we regard as the situation today.
As I said yesterday, some hon. Members may not attach any importance to statistics, but I must just give these figures, which were given in Committee, namely, that in 1951 seven murders were committed by persons of the ages of 18, 19 and 20. In 1955 and 1956 that number fell to five. It rose to nine in 1957, and to 15 in 1958, and in 1960 there were still 10 cases. That illustrates the second reason why the Government do not feel that a move in the direction of the new Clause is desirable at present.
I come now to the main issue as to whether young people below 21 should hang. I acknowledge that we have had many moving speeches on this issue. We do not wish to maintain the age of 18 for any sadistic or brutal reasons. The Royal Commission, and hon. Members in this debate, have spent some time in going into the question of the maturity or immaturity of people between the ages of 18 and 21. Those who favoured and now favour raising the age below which the death penalty cannot be imposed to 21 rely on the argument that below 21 young people's characters are not yet formed and the chances of changes of character are better amongst them than among older offenders.
I do not think that it can be said from studying the crimes which I, unfortunately, have to study that young people under 21 are necessarily immature. Some of them are the ringleaders in many of the incidents which come to our notice. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford that if we raise the age to 21 it may give the wrong impression to some young people of the seriousness and nature of the offence of capital murder.
We all find it absolutely repugnant to condemn a young man to death, but I draw the attention of the House to the


fact that the prerogative of mercy remains. In England, of the four persons under the age of 21 who have been convicted of capital murder since the Homicide Act came into operation two have been reprieved. The hon. Member for Widnes said that these are very small numbers. He used that as an argument for us to support the Clause. My own feeling is that we should be thankful that the numbers are so small, but I do not think that nevertheless we should be justified in accepting the Clause as it stands.

Mr. Weitzman: Will the Home Secretary enlighten me about something which puzzles me greatly? Why is it not right to send young persons under 21 to prison if it is right to hang them?

Mr. Butler: The hon. and learned Member and his hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) drew attention to the merits of this Measure, particularly in regard to Clause 4. I am very grateful to have any of the merits of the Bill pointed out. They are distinct merits. It is a good thing not to send children to prison, but in the present state of society and of crime it would be a mistake to accept the Clause and alter the age below which the death penalty cannot be imposed.
I shall not go further into the matter, because I do not think that I can go into further arguments more than I have done. I will now sum up.

Mr. Michael Foot: The Home Secretary referred to the exercise of the Royal Prerogative and said that a reprieve had been granted in two cases. Will he say whether in those two cases the fact that the accused were under 21 influenced his judgment at all, and if so, why?

Mr. Butler: The hon. Member raised this question in his speech yesterday, and I well remember it. I nodded assent when he asked me, across the Floor, if youth had any effect upon a Home Secretary in exercising the Royal Prerogative. Anyone who has held my office knows that it is obviously one of the considerations which one takes into account. Age has a marked effect. I cannot give particulars of particular cases, but the answer to the hon. Gentleman, in general, is in the affirmative.
I said that I would not speak for long, because our reasons are simple, but none the less sincere. The Government take the view that it is not the time to reform or amend the 1957 Act. Therefore, it is not the time for this partial amendment by the Clause to be made. It is not wise to do that at present in view of the state of crime. It is not wise to raise the age to 21 in present circumstances and perhaps give young people the idea that capital murder is not a heinous and terrible crime. These are our reasons, and by these reasons we stand.

Miss Alice Bacon: This has been a really first class debate with some excellent speeches from both sides of the House. Just as I said yesterday that I was speaking solely for myself, so again on this issue I am speaking for myself, since there will be a free vote on this side of the House. I am very grateful indeed to those hon. Members on both sides, particularly hon. Members opposite, for the support they have given to the Clause. Life and death is not a matter of party consideration, and I know full well that hon. Members opposite who feel very strongly about this will be with us on the Cause, just as some of them were in Committee.
Yesterday I congratulated the Home Secretary on the speech he made on corporal punishment. I cannot congratulate him on the speech he has made on this issue. He was much more convincing yesterday than he was today, which leads me to believe that my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) is right in saying that if the right hon. Gentleman were a back bencher today he would perhaps come with us into the Division Lobby on the Clause.
The main reason why the right hon. Gentleman resisted the Clause was that in his view it is too soon to draw conclusions about the Homicide Act, 1957. This Clause has nothing whatever to do with the working of the Homicide Act of 1957. That Measure made no difference at all to the minimum age at which people could be hanged. In fact, the last change made in that respect was in 1908, when the age was raised from 16 to 18. It is true to say, however, that before that time—from 1887


onwards—nobody under 18 years of age had been hanged. Although the law was that a boy or girl of 16 or 17 could be hanged, they were all reprieved. Therefore, this Clause has nothing to do with the 1957 Act; it is concerned solely with the minimum age at which young people can be sent to the gallows.
The hon. Member for Gravesend (Mr. Kirk) said yesterday evening that although he was an abolitionist—in favour of the total abolition of the death penalty—he could not vote for this Clause; but he added that he would not vote against it because it went only part of the way. I think that he misunderstood the whole purpose of this Criminal Justice Bill.
This Bill is concerned with the treatment of the young offender; that is, with the treatment of young people under the age of 21. We must consider all methods of treatment. We are considering borstal and detention centres; yesterday we considered whether or not young people under 21 should be subject to corporal punishment. In dealing with this very important Bill, and in deciding the penalties to be inflicted on those under 21, we must consider whether or not hanging shall still be one of those penalties. We would be neglecting our duty very much if we did not consider this extremely important matter in connection with this Measure.
Like the hon. Member for Gravesend, I am in favour of the total abolition of the death penalty, but even with the continuation of the death sentence as it is at present, I believe that there is a very strong case for raising the age from 18 to 21. I would have thought that even some of those hon. Members who are in favour of the operation of the death penalty would feel that in this one respect they could vote for this Clause in order to raise the age from 18 to 21.
Much has been said about whether or not people of this age are responsible, but anybody with teenage children knows that among a great many teenage people today there is an instability. They are impressionable, they lack judgment, and, as has been pointed out, because of this 21 is regarded as the age when boys and girls come of age. They cannot vote until they are 21.

They cannot marry without their parents' consent until they are 21. They cannot make a will or be declared bankrupt, and so on.
The hon. Member for Ormskirk (Sir D. Glover), in a rather extraordinary speech yesterday evening, said that if young people under 21 were old enough to be conscripted into the Army they were old enough to hang. That is what I understood him to say. Speaking as one who has supported conscription in time of need, I would have thought that the fact that we conscript teenagers into the Army and prepare them to fight was a reason for accepting the new Clause.
Some people have said that young people today mature earlier. If we are referring to physical maturity, I would agree. Young people today do mature earlier physically, but, perhaps, not mentally. I believe that this earlier physical maturity sometimes produces more emotional upheaval in these teenagers.
The hon. and learned Member for Epsom (Mr. Rawlinson) argued earlier this afternoon that because a person committing this crime knew what was right and what was wrong that person should be subjected to the death penalty. I am sure he is aware that in this country the age of criminal responsibility is not 18 but 8. That is the age, unfortunately, at which we adjudge people to have some kind of criminal responsibility—

Mr. Rawlinson: What I said, and I had hoped that I made myself perfectly clear, was that if a person aged 18 managed to buy a pistol, managed to buy ammunition for it, managed to load it, to put it in his pocket and later to kill someone, it could be said that he knew perfectly well what he was doing, and knew that what he was doing was not right.

Miss Bacon: That is just what I was saying; that, unfortunately—but it is the law—we adjudge the age of criminal responsibility as being 8 years and not 18 years but, surely, we would not want to go back to the time when we could hang them from the age of 8 onwards.
As long ago as 1930 the Select Committee on Capital Punishment recommended, with a substantial majority, that the age at which a person could be


hanged should be raised to 21. On that occasion, the Home Office gave evidence in favour of raising the age from 18 to 21. I know that it is very difficult to get any arbitrary division here. Whatever age we fix, we shall have some below it who are, perhaps, more mature than some who are over that age, but the whole idea at the back of the Bill is that there should be a different approach to the treatment of young people under 21 years of age. As one of my hon. Friends pointed out during the Home Secretary's speech, one of the ideas at the back of the Bill is that we should keep young people under 21 out of prison. This Bill recognises that the approach to those under 21 should be different from that to those above.
As I have said, comparatively recently the age at which a person can be hanged was raised from 16 to 18. One of the arguments put forward by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney-General during the Committee stage—in fact, I think the only argument he put forward on the matter—was that if we lowered the age from 21 to 18 the gun would be carried by the person who was under 18 years of age. That, of course, can be argued whatever the age may be. Whether we fix the age at 16, 18, 21 or 25, that argument remains.
Whenever a hanging takes place, whether it is the hanging of someone over 21 or under 21, we all feel uncomfortable and uneasy. That is particularly so when the person concerned is under 21 years of age. It is significant that although many people in general say that they are in favour of the death penalty, those very same people will rush to sign petitions, particularly where a person under 21 is involved and when a reprieve is being sought.
Yesterday, we considered birching and caning. I give those hon. Members who voted for that form of punishment credit for honestly believing that by birching and caning they could reform the criminal. Some of them honestly believed that.
5.30 p.m.
But surely this matter is altogether different. I am sure that some of those who yesterday voted in favour of birching and caning would not wish to wipe these youngsters off the face of the earth. If

that is all that we can do with teenagers, it is an admission of failure. We are saying, in effect, that we think that the measures envisaged in the Bill will fail and that all other methods will be inadequate.
I realise that there are many people who do not like the death penalty but feel that we must have it as a deterrent. I therefore must spend one or two minutes on the deterrent effect of the death penalty. I should have hesitated for a long time before tabling this new Clause if I had thought that the death penalty was a deterrent, particularly to youngsters of this age. As I understood the hon. and learned Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Hobson), he said that most young people who commit murders think that they will not be found out. In other words, he did not think that the death penalty was a deterrent. I think he is quite right. I do not believe that they think about the consequences. Young thugs under 21 years do not contemplate murder and they are not deterred either by hanging or the possibility of life imprisonment. These are usually senseless and impetuous murders. These people are merely acting big. They get a gun, go out and do not think what they are doing.
Other countries have abolished the death penalty. Post-1957 figures show that the number of murders in this country has fallen. Perhaps one of the best comparisons is between states in America and Australia. As between similar states in America, one has abolished the death penalty and the other has not. Similarly, in Australia. As between New South Wales and Queensland, one of them has abolished the death penalty and the other has not. The amazing thing is that the crime wave in both these States was exactly the same. It was a wave of crime rather than the fact that the death penalty was abolished.
The hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) asked us on this side, as he asked in Committee, what was our alternative. If we abolished the death penalty for people under 21 years, what was our alternative? Did we propose to substitute a life sentence which was in fact a life sentence, or what? We are not creating a new problem. This is a problem which already exists with those murderers who are found guilty of non-capital murder. I am sure that no one


will say that some of these murders are less heinous than some of those called capital murders. It is a problem which exists with those under 21 who are found guilty of a capital murder but are reprieved. As my hon. Friend the Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) said last night, this merely adds to a problem which already exists.
It is said that eventually this Clause might be accepted, but that we should leave the matter for the time being and wait. People say, "Leave the age at 21 and leave a reserve power of reprieve in the hands of the Home Secretary." The Royal Commission stated that special consideration was always given to youth in considering reprieves. I believe that it is very unfair on any Home Secretary to leave this dreadful power in his hands. It is a power which no one should be asked to bear. If we believe that 18 is too young an age at which to hang a person and that the age should be 21, we should say so quite clearly in this House and not say, "We think that people under 21 should not be hanged, but let us leave it to the Home Secretary."
My hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne referred to the matter of mistakes. I think that a few years ago most people in this country would have said that it was impossible in

England for an innocent man to go to the gallows. Can anyone really say that today? At any age, this is a ghastly matter, but when a young life is concerned it is even worse.

If we continue to hang young people, what will we have done? I suggest that we shall have done nothing at all and that it is no solution to the present crime wave. We shall have created a world of false values. We are all in some way responsible and we cannot get rid of that responsibility merely by saying, "Hang them". We do not achieve anything by hanging young people and we shall not have solved the great problem that there is to solve.

I therefore hope that the new Clause will be accepted. I am certain that if it is we will feel that we have done something worth while and that we have taken a step in the right direction. I hope that, not only those in favour of abolition, but some of those who feel that a death penalty is necessary, will say that it is much too final for people under 21 years. I hope that many hon. Members will follow us into the Lobby in favour of our proposal.

Question put, That the Clause be read a Second time:—

The House divided: Ayes 144, Noes 229.

Division No. 132.]
AYES
[5.38 p.m.


Ainsley, William
Fernyhough, E.
Hynd, H. (Accrington)


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Fletcher, Eric
Hynd, John (Attercliffe)


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Foot, Dingle (Ipswich)
Janner, Sir Barnett


Awbery, Stan
Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas


Bacon, Miss Alice
Forman, J. C.
Jenkins, Roy (Stechford)


Benson, Sir George
Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)


Blackburn, F.
Galtskell, Rt. Hon. Hugh
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)


Bowen, Roderic (Cardigan)
George, Lady MeganLloyd(Crmrthn)
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)


Bowles, Frank
Ginsburg, David
Kelley, Richard


Braddock, Mrs. E. M.
Cordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.
Key, Ht. Hon. C. W.


Brockway, A. Fenner
Gourlay, Harry
Lawson, George


Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)
Greenwood, Anthony
Ledger, Ron


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Grey, Charles
Lee, Frederick (Newton)


Callaghan, James
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)


Chetwynd, George
Griffiths, W. (Exchange)
Lipton, Marcus


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Grimond, J.
Loughlin, Charles


Crosland, Anthony
Gunter, Ray
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson


Crossman, R. H. S.
Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W)
MacColl, James


Cullen, Mrs. Alice
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Coine Valley)
McInnes, James


Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)
Hamilton, William (West Fife)
McLeavy, Frank


Davies, Harold, (Leek)
Hart, Mrs. Judith
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)


d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Hayman, F. H.
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)


Deer, George
Healey, Denis
Manuel, A. C.


Delargy, Hugh
Henderson, Rt. Hn. Arthur(RwlyRegls)
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.


Dempsey, James
Herbison, Miss Margaret
Marsh, Richard


Diamond, John
Hill, J. (Midlothian)
Millan, Bruce


Dodds, Norman
Holman, Percy
Mitchison, G. R.


Ede, Rt. Hon. C.
Holt, Arthur
Moyle, Arthur


Edelman, Maurice
Houghton, Douglas
Mulley, Frederick


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
Howell, Charles A.
Oliver, G. H.


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Oram, A. E.


Edwards, Walter (Stepney)
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Oswald, Thomas


Evans, Albert
Hunter, A. E.
Owen, Will




Paget, H. T.
Ross, William
Wade, Donald


Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)
Short, Edward
Wainwright, Edwin


Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Silverman, Julius (Aston)
Warbey, William


Plummer, Sir Leslie
Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)
Weitzman, David


Popplewell, Ernest
Slater, Mrs. Harriet (Stoke, N.)
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


Prentice, R. E.
Slater, Joseph (Sedgefield)
Whitlock, William


Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)
Small, William
Wilkins, W. A.


Proctor, W. T.
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)
Willey, Frederick


Pursey, Cmdr. Harry
Sorensen, R. W.
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Randall, Harry
Spriggs, Leslie
Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)


Rankin, John
Steele, Thomas
Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)


Redhead, E. C.
Stewart, Michael (Fulham)
Woof, Robert


Reid, William
Swingier, Stephen
Zilliacus, K.


Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Sylvester, George



Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)
Taylor, John (West Lothian)
Mr. Victor Yates and Mr. Fitch.




NOES


Agnew, Sir Peter
Finlay, Graeme
McMaster, Stanley R.


Allason, James
Fisher, Nigel
Macpherson, Niall (Dumfries)


Arbuthnot, John
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Maginnis, John E.


Ashton, Sir Hubert
Forrest, George
Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R.


Barber, Anthony
Fraser, Hn. Hugh (Stafford &amp; Stone)
Markham, Major Sir Frank


Barlow, Sir John
Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)
Marples, Rt. Hon. Ernest


Batsford, Brian
Freeth, Denzil
Marten, Neil


Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)
Gammans, Lady
Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)


Bell, Ronald
Gibson-Watt, David
Mawby, Ray


Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Glover, sir Douglas
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.


Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gos &amp;amp; Fhm)
Goodhart, Philip
Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.


Bevlns, Rt. Hon. Reginald (Toxteth)
Goodhew, Victor
Mills, Stratton


Bidgood, John C.
Gough, Frederick
Montgomery, Fergus


Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel
Grant-Ferris, Wg Cdr. R.
Moody, A. S.


Bishop, F. P.
Green, Alan
Moore, Sir Thomas (Ayr)


Black, Sir Cyril
Gresham Cooke, R.
More, Jasper (Ludlow)


Bossom, Clive
Grimston, Sir Robert
Morrison, John


Bourne-Arton, A
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.
Nabarro, Gerald


Box, Donald
Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)
Neave, Airey


Boyle, Sir Edward
Harris, Reader (Heston)
Nicholls, Sir Harmar


Braine, Bernard
Harrison, Brian (Maldon)
Noble, Michael


Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col.Sir Walter
Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)
Oakshott, Sir Hendrie


Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry
Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)
Orr, Capt. L. P. S.


Brown, Alan (Tottenham)
Hastings, Stephen
Osborn, John (Hallam)


Browne, Percy (Torrington)
Hay, John
Osborne, Cyril (Louth)


Bryan, Paul
Henderson, John (Cathcart)
Page, John (Harrow, West)


Buck, Antony
Hiley, Joseph
Page, Graham (Crosby)


Bullard, Denys
Hill, Mrs. Eveline (Wythenshawe)
Pannell, Norman (Kirkdale)


Bullus, Wing Commander Eric
Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)
Partridge, E.


Burden, F. A.
Hirst, Geoffrey
Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)


Butcher, Sir Herbert
Hobson, John
Peel, John


Butler, Rt.Hn.R.A. (Saffron Walden)
Hocking, Philip N.
Peyton, John


Campbell, Sir David (Belfast, S.)
Holland, Philip
Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth


Carr, Compton (Barons Court)
Hollingworth, John
Pike, Miss Mervyn


Cary, Sir Robert
Hopkins, Alan
Pitt, Miss Edith


Channon, H. P. G.
Hornsby-Smith, Rt. Hon. Patricia
Pott, Percivall


Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)
Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)
Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch


Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)
Howard, John (Southampton, Test)
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Cleaver, Leonard
Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral John
Prior, J. M. L.


Cole, Norman
Hughes-Young, Michael
Prior-Palmer, Brig, Sir Otho


Cooke, Robert
Hulbert, Sir Norman
Proudfoot, Wilfred


Cooper, A. E.
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Pym, Francis


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Iremonger, T. L.
Ramsden, James


Corfield, F. V.
Jackson, John
Rawlinson, Peter


Costain, A. P.
James, David
Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin


Coulson, J. M.
Jennings, J. C.
Rees, Hugh


Craddock, Sir Beresford
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Cunningham, Knox
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Renton, David


Curran, Charles
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Ridley, Hon. Nicholas


Currie, G. B. H.
Kerans, Cdr. J. S.
Roberts, Sir Peter (Heeley)


Dalkeith, Earl of
Kerby, Capt. Henry
Roots, William


Dance, James
Kerr, Sir Hamilton
Russell, Ronald


Deedes, W. F.
Kershaw, Anthony
Scott-Hopkins, James


de Ferranti, Basil
Lagden, Godfrey
Shaw, M.


Digby, Simon Wingfield
Leburn, Gilmour
Shepherd, William


Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.
Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry
Skeet, T. H. H.


Drayson, G. B.
Lindsay, Martin
Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'rd &amp;amp; Chiswick)


du Cann, Edward
Linstead, Sir Hugh
Smyth, Brig. Sir John (Norwood)


Duncan, Sir James
Litchfield, Capt. John
Spearman, Sir Alexander


Duthie, Sir William
Longden, Gilbert
Speir, Rupert


Eden, John
Low, Rt. Hon. Sir Toby
Stevens, Geoffrey


Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Elliott, R. W. (Nwcstle-upon-Tyne, N.)
McAdden, Stephen
Stodart, J. A.


Farey-Jones, F. W.
MacArthur, Ian
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm


Farr, John
Maclean, SirFitzroy(Bute&amp;amp;N. Ayrs.)
Storey, Sir Samuel


Fell, Anthony
Macleod, Rt. Hn. Iain (Enfield, W.)
Studholme, Sir Henry







Sumner, Donald (Orpington)
Vane, W. M. F.
Williams, Dudley (Exeter)


Talbot, John E.
Vaughan-Morgan, Sir John
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)
Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis
Wise, A. R.


Temple, John M.
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)
Woodhouse, C. M.


Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret
Walder, David
Woodnutt, Mark


Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)
Walker, Peter
Woollam, John


Thomas, Peter (Conway)
Ward, Dame Irene
Worsley, Marcus


Thompson, Richard (Croydon, S.)
Watte, James



Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin
Webster, David
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Tilney, John (Wavertree)
Wells, John (Maidstone)
Mr. Chichester-Clark and


Turner, Colin
Wells, Percy (Faversham)
Mr. Gordon Campbell.


van Straubenzee, W. R.
Whitelaw, William

New Clause.—(CORPORAL PUNISHMENT IN DETENTION CENTRES.)

The wardens and officers of a detention centre shall have the same rights and power of administering corporal punishment to an} person serving a sentence at a detention centre as if he were a schoolmaster responsible for the education of the person concerned.—[Mr Deedes.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

5.45 p.m.

Mr. Deedes: I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
I hope that I shall be acquitted of seeking to revive the subject of corporal punishment by a side-wind. The last thing I want to do is to revive the arguments on judicial corporal punishment which we rehearsed here adequately yesterday.
On the other hand, I am a strong supporter of the régime of the detention centre and the prospects which it offers of remedial treatment for certain types of offender, and as an alternative to corporal punishment. Ever since the institutions were set up I have believed that the short, sharp shock which was originally associated with them, and the consistently disciplined régime of the detention centre, was more closely related to the needs of some of these young men than a few strokes of the birch. It follows that if the detention centre is to be a satisfactory substitute for corporal punishment, as some of us hope that it will be, it must maintain a high standard of discipline.
My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, stressed that aspect in our discussions yesterday, and he assured us that it was not his intention not to have a strict régime. I accept what he said, and I am very glad to hear it. Commenting on something which he said later, I admit that I have been one of those who have suspected of late that the detention centre is losing its sting and is not quite what it was when it started seven or eight years

ago. If I am wrong in that belief, I am only too pleased to learn it. I know that my right hon. Friend accepts that if we do not keep a strict standard of discipline in the detention centre we shall not only fail in our purpose there but shall also break faith with a great many people in this country who at the bottom of their hearts want to see the birch back but can be persuaded to give this alternative a fair trial.
If we accept what my right hon. Friend said at its full value, the fact remains that in future the detention centre will have to deal with a much wider range of subjects. They are to have a very mixed bag of offenders, due not least to the proposals contained in the Bill. They are to become a comprehensive school of penology. The danger is not that discipline will be deliberately relaxed but that the régime will be increasingly geared not to the young thug who was envisaged when the detention centre was set up but to the majority, to the run-of-the-mill characters, to the juveniles who have committed a wide range of offence meriting detention to up to six months. That is to be the rode of the detention centre. There the problem arises—and it will arise more acutely in future—of preventing a minority of tough characters from interfering with the main purpose of the detention centre. There is already a number of these tough characters in the detention centres, which are no longer places where first offenders go for, it is hoped, their first and their last taste of detention.
I am well aware that to deal with the recalcitrants there is a series of deterrents at the detention centres for such offenders, and those have been described and include removal for up to 14 days from corporate life, extra work or fatigue, stoppage of earnings, solitary confinement, restricted diet, and last, loss of remission of up to seven days. On paper that makes an impressive list. I wish I could feel sure it would make


as strong an impression on the minds of the young men—

Mr. Scholefield Allen: The hon. Gentleman has just said that these detention centres are for recalcitrant persons, people who have records behind them, but is he aware that many conscientious objectors have been sent to these detention centres? I have protested about it, quite without avail. Men of unblemished character, and standing for a principle, have been sent to detention centres.

Mr. Deedes: Yes. I do not think the hon. and learned Gentleman has quite got my point. What I am saying is that the variety of characters in the detention centres is going to be much wider than it has been, and it will include a minority of characters who will be very tough to handle indeed.
It may be asked, talking of the impression which the existing penalties make upon them, will the cane make any greater impression? I am not going to exaggerate the contribution which I think this new Clause would make, and I ask hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite not to exaggerate the drawbacks, either. It is, in my opinion, a small rôle which this would fill, not a large one, and I am not thinking of severe pain to be inflicted, or even the fear of it. I have in mind the young touch, the bully, and there are one or two of them in the detention centres, who consistently demonstrate contempt for the régime and by infringements large and small have a consistently bad influence on the other inmates. I think that the ego and the influence of that sort of young man can be deflated by the cane as by no other means. I think that the cane in this context can be a deflating agency; not a pain inflicting instrument, not any one of the adjectives some people might apply to it, but a deflating agency.
This new Clause does not prescribe—as I have accused some of my hon. Friends for failing to prescribe yesterday—the offences for which it may be used. That is left to the staff. I think that is right. It may be said the staff have not asked for it, to which I would say that we are not compelling the staff to use it. We are only saying that the cane should be in existence and in reserve;

no more than in reserve. It is there if wanted; and since it is there if it is wanted in some of our national schools I cannot see—although I can see administrative difficulties in giving effect to the Clause—that any great new principle is involved.
As I said, I do not want to make a long speech on the matter, but I think that this really must be added, that the cost of keeping a boy at a detention centre today is £562 9s. 1d., that is, £18 more than the cost of keeping a boy at Eton, and I would add in all seriousness that it is more difficult—this is one of the tragedies—to get a boy into a detention centre today than to get one into Eton. Magistrates in many parts of the country will confirm that. [An HON. MEMBER: "But who wants to go there?"] I do not see why a detention centre should be denied the advantages, as I believe they are, of the more privileged penalties of a public school.
This innovation meets, in my view, the two principal objections, which I accept, to judicial corporal punishment. The first is delay. There will be no delay, or there should be none. The second is the lack of continued relationship with the man who administers the punishment. The offender will be there for three months with the man who administers the punishment and there will be a continuing relationship with the man administering the punishment.
I do not put the proposal forward as a supreme deterrent or anything like that. I put it forward because I believe, as, indeed, I believe my right hon. Friend does, that it is crucial to make the detention centres successful, and that we ought not to overlook any suggestion which might help to make them so. I know from my own researches that this is not as simple to implement as it may appear. I am not going to pretend to my right hon. Friend or to my hon. Friends that I do not know that. This looks beguilingly simple on the Notice Paper.
Administratively, it will be a fairly complicated matter to incorporate the cane into the disciplinary system, and so I do not expect a complete acceptance of the Clause as it stands by my right hon. Friend—quite apart from the fact that, upon inspection, I find that the standard of the grammar is very defective, for which I express regret. I would,


however, like an assurance that this rule involved here will be examined by the Government in the hope and expectation that a way can be found to incorporate this principle. It is for that reason I urge my right hon. Friend to accept it.

Mr. R. A. Butler: The reason I rise now is that I feel that the Government are bound in this matter by a statement made by the Attorney-General in the Standing Committee when he said:
I undertake…to give further consideration to the question in relation to detention centres to see whether, on further inquiry, we think that there is any ground whatsoever—although on our present investigations we do not think there is—for the inclusion of such a provision."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee B, 28th February, 1961; c. 756.]
I mention that because I do not think it possible to accept the new Clause as it stands for two reasons both given by my hon. Friend. It says:
The wardens and officers of a detention centre shall have the same rights and powers of administering corporal punishment to any person serving a sentence…as if he were a schoolmaster…
That is very hard on the teaching profession and might lead to a grave deterioration in the standards of the Bill if we were to include in it the new Clause as it stands.
I am sure that my hon. Friend will not wish to press this, although he does wish to have an answer from me on the subject in general. I could not accept the new Clause as it stands for that reason, and I could not accept it for other reasons he gave, for the situation is very complicated indeed in relation to this subject. What is clear, however, is that my hon. Friend and I both object to judicial corporal punishment. On the other hand, I think that he and I and many others—taking my speech of yesterday—did not disagree when I said:
Many of us have less difficulty, as I have made clear in public statements and at conferences, with a personal relationship in beating with the cane or otherwise performed by a parent or schoolmaster in which there is a personal relationship and where there is no delay."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11th April, 1961: Vol. 638, c. 90.]
I remember that when I said that in my speech yesterday there was general acceptance on all sides. I did get a nod of assurance from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede). I think that there is general

agreement that beating of that sort is reasonable and different from judicial corporal punishment.
However, what my hon. Friend wants to do by this new Clause is to introduce the schoolmaster relationship in the detention centre with the use of the cane. I think that there is one very useful analogy to back his own argument, and that is that we do permit use of the cane, with, I think, altogether reasonable results, in approved schools. This is recognised on all hands.
6.0 p.m.
My hon. Friend wants to see it used if necessary in detention centres. The inquiry which my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General offered in Committee in the words which I have read out has only partially been completed, and that is another reason why I could not accept the new Clause today. But the preliminary results of conferring with those who run detention centres, with prison commissioners and with the Chairman of the Prison Commissioners is that if this power were to be taken it could only be regarded as being at all analogous with the schools if it were taken in the junior detention centres for those between the ages of 14 and 16 years. Even here, there are two difficulties that must be overcome. One is that the period of stay is normally three months and sometimes six months.
The second is that there are certain disciplinary procedures under the detention centre rules made under the Prison Act, 1952. If we, therefore, were to try to use these under the present system of these rules in the junior detention centres, there would be all sorts of delays, leading through a formal report and hearing for punishment by the governor under Rule 32, a hearing for serious offences by the board of visitors under Rule 33, and final confirmation or mitigation by the Secretary of State under Rule 36. If we were to introduce corporal punishment under these rules under the Prison Act, 1952, it would result in delays and might result in what I call the revulsive practice under which every single case of birching in prison has to come finally to the Secretary of State and has to be signed by him and he has to read at least seven or eight pages of minutes before he can agree.
I do not think that that is what my hon. Friend wants. It would lead to delay, it would not be the relationship between schoolmaster and the young, it would be quite out of place, and it would be getting back to all the problems of yesterday's debate on judicial punishment. We should be all unhappy about, such a development.
This matter can be considered in relation to Clause 23 which deals with the position of detention centres particularly in the junior range and which brings the Prison Commission and the Secretary of State closer together. One of the advantages of that Clause is that the Secretary of State may be able to do a little more in relation to bringing some of our methods of detention and the treatment of the young a little more in line with one another. I had had it in mind even before my hon. Friend raised this matter in Committee to review this extraordinarily rigid series of rules for junior detention centres, because the present series is really too much for young people of that age and is more suitable for older boys and for prisons.
I will tell the House all that I can undertake to do as a result of my hon. Friend's initiative. I appreciate his point. He wants a teacher-pupil relationship. I am quite unprepared to go further than that or to go into the realm of judicial punishment. I had already intended to review the rules of junior detention centres. I cannot accept the Clause, for the reasons I have given. All I can do is to see in the immediate future before the Bill is considered in another place whether we can have a review of these rules and have powers in the future in case we want them. I would not undertake to use those powers, but I think that we should consider whether we ought to take them. I have not finished my inquiries with detention centres, and that is as far as I can go to meet my hon. Friend's wishes. If action is taken by the other place the matter can come back to this House, but if we decide not to take any action it would not come back to us, and this House would have the last word on the matter.
The position, therefore, is that following an undertaking given by the Attorney-General to have an inquiry, with the inquiry not being completed

and the problem being presented as I have indicated and with the junior aspect being reviewed and my not being able to give a final answer on that today, I cannot go further than I have done, but I hope that my hon. Friend will feel assured that I have treated the new Clause with a degree of sympathy in the circumstances.

Sir G. Benson: I am sorry to hear the right hon. Gentleman say that he is treating the Clause with any degree of sympathy. Junior detention centres may be very similar to approved schools, but senior detention centres are practically identical, both in the type of individual who goes to them and in the result, with borstals and (prisons. If we are to allow the governor or a warden of a detention centre to administer corporal punishment we cannot possibly deny it to the governor of a boys' prison or the governor of a borstal. The results of Goudhurst detention centre, for example, are identical with borstal or prison. Its population is identical. That is the comparison one has to make, if one must make a comparison, and not with schools. The comparison must be with other institutions where the only people who can decide on corporal punishment are the visiting magistrates. If corporal punishment is to be introduced into adult centres it must be on the decision of the visiting magistrates and nobody else.

Sir T. Moore: I have only one or two comments to make on the Clause. After the vote of my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) last night, I am rather inclined to welcome the apparent change of heart on the subject of corporal punishment.

Mr. R. A. Butler: My hon. Friend must not be simple about this. It was clear that yesterday we all spoke from a feeling of great conviction. My views about judicial corporal punishment remain absolutely the same. I am sorry that they do, because I did not like disagreeing with my hon. Friends. I did not enjoy it at all. This is a matter with which I have said that I will try to deal on the lines suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes).

Sir T. Moore: I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend. I was merely referring to my hon. Friend the Member


for Ashford. I hate sending young people to prison or even to detention centres. The House knows my alternative. It would be far better to give them a sound whipping and send them off with a warning.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Gordon Touche): I hope that the hon. Member will deal with the new Clause.

Sir T. Moore: I will come to that. I beg your pardon, Mr. Deputy-Speaker.
I feel that the Home Secretary agrees with me that the whole thing starts with the parents, and that if parents administered suitable forms of punishment when children misbehaved there would be less chance of their misbehaving later. The same applies to schools. If there were a certain amount of punishment for misbehaviour in schools we should never need to ask for judicial punishment, but where I get out of line with my right hon. Friend is when it is suggested that there should be no corporal punishment when these young people go to the next criminal stage in the junior detention centres.
If it is agreed that corporal punishment should be given in approved schools I cannot see why it should not also be given in junior detention centres and thereby prevent the young thug or possibly a child who has misbehaved as a result of bad management on the part of someone or other from continuing in that way. Why should the child be allowed to pass from one degree of mal-education to another until he finally ends up as a confirmed criminal and possibly needs far more drastic punishment than we have hitherto considered?
However, I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford in his moving of the Clause. I am sorry that my right hon. Friend has not seen fit at the moment to accept it, but I hope that, perhaps by a change of the regulations which he undoubtedly envisages later, it may be possible at a later date to have some form of this treatment given in detention centres.

Miss Bacon: The right hon. Gentleman quoted one sentence from the speech made by the Attorney-General, but he did not quote other parts of his right hon. and learned Friend's speech, and he certainly did not quote anything from

the speech made by the Joint Under-Secretary. I want to quote some of the other things which were said by the right hon. and learned Gentleman and the hon. and learned Gentleman in the Standing Committee.
The Joint Under-Secretary of State went through a list of sanctions which could be imposed in the detention centres. After enumerating nine sanctions which could be used, he said:
The sanctions have proved effective in practice in maintaining discipline in detention centres, and that is the fundamental point. No demand has been made by the staffs of detention centres for power to inflict corporal punishment. In the absence of any evidence of a need for corporal punishment as a means of maintaining discipline, we say that there would be no justification for introducing it.
The hon. and learned Gentleman said a little later:
It would be a pity if we were to introduce anything which might, in even a few cases, destroy that relationship."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee B, 28th February, 1961; c. 740.]
The Attorney-General, in addition to the one sentence quoted by the Home Secretary, said:
The conclusion that corporal punishment is unnecessary in detention centres derives not only from the views of the wardens of detention centres but also from the fact that discipline has been maintained without difficulty without this sanction. That is an important point."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee B, 28th February, 1961; c. 756.]
I welcome the fact that the right hon. Gentleman says that before he does anything this will be brought back to the House. I hope that, in addition to the other things which he is considering, he will remember that boys are in detention centres for a much shorter period of time than they are in approved schools, day schools or even borstal, where there is not this power, and that, that being so, there might not be the same relationship between the master in the detention centre and the boy. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will bear all that in mind and also the views expressed by his two hon. Friends during the Committee stage.

Mr. Deedes: In view of what my right hon. Friend has said and the facts given by him, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion, and Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 1.—(CONDITIONS FOR AND TERM OF SENTENCE OF BORSTAL TRAINING.)

6.15 p.m.

Mr. R. A. Butler: I beg to move, in page 1, to leave out lines 12 to 17.
The Amendment, as is known to the House, and especially to right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite, repeals an Amendment passed during the Committee stage, about which there has been a certain degree of controversy. I wish to express to the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) my regrets that as there was this Division in the Committee and the Amendment passed as it did, she and her hon. Friends were in that way apparently deprived of the opportunity of voting against the Clause. However, the hon. Lady has made her position clear, and I gather that if we take out this proviso, which is what I now recommend that we should do, she will then wish to take more objection to the Clause than she would otherwise have done. I sympathise about that, but that is a little error which has arisen in the course of these general interchanges.
The position is that the hon. Lady and her hon. Friends would prefer to retain the proviso because they do not wish a person under 16 to be committed to quarter sessions for a borstal sentence, until adequate remand centres are available to the courts.
Under the proviso to subsection (2) of the Clause as drafted, as applied by subsection (4), a magistrates' court may not commit a person under 17 for a borstal sentence unless it is of the opinion that no other method of dealing with him is appropriate. The provision that the Amendment would delete applies only to offenders for whom borstal provides the only suitable form of training.
Therefore, we are faced with the difficulty that, if we leave the Bill as it is, any convicted offenders of this age for whom in the opinion of the court borstal provides the only suitable form of training would not be able to be sent to borstal and might have to be sent to some other institution which was not suitable. Because the Government think that that issue is more important than the question of remand centres being ready, they have decided to remove this proviso, with the approval of the House, and to restore the Bill as

it was originally, regardless of the question of remand centres. It is essential if the Bill is to operate that we should have this proviso out. Although I know that the motive of right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite is that children should not go to prison, the fact that Clause I has this particular objective makes me feel that we should stick to the original form.
I want to take the opportunity in moving the Amendment, to which we attach importance, to give the latest news about the remand centre programme, which has not yet been made public. There is no doubt—it is no good burking the fact—that owing to the big drive that we made over the prison building programme and particularly the detention centre programme, the remand centre programme has not gone forward as quickly as it should have done. Under "Penal Practice in a Changing Society", which I had the honour to produce for the benefit of the House and the country, giving an idea of our methods of penal reform, we have a 31-institution building programme, one of the biggest prison building programmes in recent times. We have a terrible leeway to make up, not only in respect of detention centres, about which I spoke yesterday, but also in relation to 7,000 people who are still sleeping three in a cell.
I shall during the next month be laying the foundation stone for our new prison at Blundeston, the most up-to-date prison in the world. We are definitely making progress. We have given more priority to some other things and not sufficient to the remand centres, but, with the aid of the Prison Commissioners and their new chairman, we have now framed a complete programme for the remand centres. Not only are we proceeding with Risley, which is to remain an all-purpose adult and juvenile centre, rather like an immense battleship in the north-west of England, which will be very valuable for the courts in the north-west—it will be one of the most up-to-date buildings of its type in the world, and it is going ahead apace—but we have decided as a matter of policy to provide in the first place centres for young offenders only.
The first of these, covering the London area, will be opened at Ashford. I regret that the name "Ashford" comes


so often into our debates, but this is Ashford, Middlesex, and the centre is for the purposes of the London area. We intended to use this as a borstal allocation centre, but it will be used now as a remand centre. It will be opened about next July. This is a start for the London area. A further seven centres will be required. These will be purpose-built. So much of a drive have we had—[Interruption.]—the hon. Lady may well say "at last"—that sites for all seven of these are in view, five on Prison Commissioners' property and two on other Government land.
This building programme cannot be completed in less than three years—it is no good saying it can—because of the time that it takes to prepare contracts for the work and everything else. Three of the centres will adjoin, but be entirely segregated from, prisons. They are simply there for the purpose of being in the neighbourhood, and they will be segregated. In the four other cases it is the intention to site and design the centres in such a way that they can be extended later for adult offenders if that is thought desirable. All of that relates to male offenders under the age of 21.
Women and girls on remand outside London will probably be accommodated at Risley and in probably three other centres to be built as annexes to the proposed young offenders' centres. The accommodation of women and girls in London depends on the future of Holloway, which we have actively in mind. It depends on the success and progress we are at present making in setting up a women's security prison outside London. Probably Holloway will be used for this new purpose when it ceases to be a women's security prison.
When the centres are completed, there will be centres in Middlesex and Lancashire, near Durham, Leeds, Birmingham, and Bristol, and at Exeter and Cardiff. It is also proposed to have one at Winchester, so that we are covering the whole country and are getting on with the job. It is a fleet building programme.

Mr. Ellis Smith: What is the total cost?

Mr. Butler: I cannot give the figures now, but perhaps I can do so before the

debate ends. We are doing all this on purpose, because we think it time that the programme for remand centres was brought to the front.
The motive for the Amendment which was carried in Standing Committee was to prevent young people from going to prison and to see that the remand centre programme was hurried up. We have hurried it up, and think that the primary purpose of Clause 1 is essential and that, therefore, the proviso should be taken out by the House with the approval of the House, if we can achieve it. The hon. Lady can be satisfied in that her adventure has at least had some success, for it has hurried on the Government's programme.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Sir William Anstruther-Gray): The Question is, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill.

Mr. MacColl: On a point of order. Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I want to protect the next Amendment on the Order Paper, in page 1, line 14 to leave out from "subsection" to "which" in line 15 and to insert
(4) of section twenty-eight of the Magistrates' Courts Act, 1952".
It is a drafting Amendment. I am not certain, in view of the form in which you have just put the Question, whether that Amendment would be protected.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: As I understand it, I am proceeding correctly in putting the Government Amendment. I think that the next Amendment is bound to fall whatever the result. Either these words stand or they do not stand.

Mr. MacColl: Further to that point of order. I do not attempt to rival you and your advisers in matters of procedure. I presume that the object of our exercise is to produce intelligible legislation. It happens that the drafting Amendment is essential for the Bill, because it is an alteration in the Act which is referred to. Therefore, it would merely make the House look ludicrous if it were not able to approve that Amendment.
It would surely be wrong if it were assumed by the Chair that something proposed by the Government will automatically go through and that the House


will not have an opportunity of expressing its view. If, as we hope, the House rejects the view of the Government on this matter, it is most important that the drafting Amendment should then be put.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Perhaps I can simplify the matter by saying that my understanding was that the second Amendment was not to be called. The whole debate can be covered on the Government Amendment, so any consideration of the second Amendment is irrelevant because the Government Amendment only is being selected.

Mr. MacColl: Further to that point of order, with even greater respect than my previous submissions. The Chair is presumably being impartial between the two sides in this discussion. The Government wish to alter the decision of the Standing Committee. If it happens that the House has enough independence of mind to accept the views of the Standing Committee and not to alter what the Standing Committee put into the Bill, it would be a ludicrous situation not to be able to make a drafting Amendment, which is on the Order Paper, and which is necessary to make the Clause intelligible. Surely the whole point of a Report stage is to tidy up drafting errors.
The Government are constantly putting whole strings of drafting Amendments into Bills, and they have all the expert advice behind them in avoiding mistakes. It is not unnatural that a Standing Committee, which does not have a phalanx of expert advice behind it, has to make a drafting Amendment, following the Government's admirable precedent. I cannot believe that a rule of order would prevent the House from making a drafting improvement which is necessary if the Bill is to keep its present form.

Mr. R. A. Butler: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. If the Government fail to carry their Amendment, you would presumably wish to put the second Amendment so that the Bill would be correctly drafted. We should not wish to stand in the way of that if order permitted.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that we had better go as far as we have gone, which is that I have put the Question, "That the words proposed to be left

out stand part of the Bill". We should debate that Question and decide it. The future is in the future.

Miss Bacon: We were very pleased to hear what the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary said about remand centres, but I believe that he has been rather clever in the way in which he has moved his Amendment, because, by outlining the programme for remand centres, he will inevitably get the Press tomorrow morning. He has, however, rather hidden the main purpose behind the Amendment.
I want to get back to the Amendment before I say anything about remand centres. We have been told by the right hon. Gentleman on several occasions that the main purpose of the Bill is eventually to keep young people out of prison. The Amendment will mean that in the next few years many young children at 15 years of age will go into prison. That is the purpose at the back of the Amendment.
For the benefit of those hon. Members who were not present at the Standing Committee proceedings, perhaps I can recall what happened about this Clause. The Clause reduces the borstal age from 16 to 15. Many Members on both sides had considerable misgivings about reducing that age. We thought that it was acceptable only if we put certain safeguards into the Clause, and we moved an Amendment, which was debated for over two hours, and was supported by three Members opposite, including the hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) and was carried by sixteen votes to fifteen. Because the Amendment was carried, we did not proceed to vote against the Clause as a whole, while we would otherwise have done, and as. I think, probably the hon. Member for Ayr and his hon. Friends would have done.
It has been said that the proposal of the Clause to reduce the borstal age was made because there are some 15-year-olds who are unsuitable for approved schools. If that is so, we should do something about the whole set-up and organisation of the approved schools. However, that is, at the moment, another matter A magistrates' court cannot commit initially a young person to borstal. It can only recommend that he be committed to a higher court with a view to going to


borstal. It is this intervening period between his appearance at a magistrates' court and his appearance at the higher court which gives us very great misgivings.
6.30 p.m.
The Criminal Justice Act, 1948, re-enacted a provision of the Magistrates' Courts Act, 1952—and this is a provision which we would like to alter if the Amendment is defeated. That provision says that the intervening period between the appearance of a boy or girl at a magistrates' court and his appearance in the higher court for sentence must be spent either in a remand centre—not to be confused with a remand home—or in prison.
Even today, not one remand centre has yet been built, in spite of what we have heard about the building programme, so that the intervening period on remand must be spent in prison. That is bad enough for 16-year-olds and 17-year-olds, but the effect of reducing the borstal age from 16 to 15 is that 15-year-olds waiting to appear at a higher court will have to spend the remand period in prison. The words which the right hon. Gentleman is now seeking to delete are:
Provided that a magistrates' court shall not commit a person under the age of sixteen years with a view to a sentence of borstal training under paragraph (a) of subsection (2) of section twenty-seven of the Criminal Justice Act, 1948"—
which should be the Magistrates' Courts Act, 1952—
(which provides for the notification of the availability of remand centres), applies to him.
In other words, unless a remand centre is available, no 15-year-old shall be remanded in prison while waiting to go to a higher court with a view to being committed to borstal.
That was a perfectly reasonable Amendment and it was passed by the Committee. Its effect would have been to postpone the operation of the Clause, but it would have been better for that to be done until the remand centres were ready. Now the right hon. Gentleman has told us that some will be ready in the very near future.
Although the Criminal Justice Act, 1948, provided for remand centres, none has been built in the twelve years and more since the Act was passed. While we have been very pleased to hear what

the right hon. Gentleman has said about the building programme, he himself admitted that it was rather belated progress, because he said that I would probably say, "And about time, too."
Time spent on remand can be anything from a week to three months. We are told that our prisons are overcrowded and that hundreds of prisoners are sleeping three in a cell. If the right hon. Gentleman has his way and takes out these words, many 15-year-olds will be sleeping three in a cell, and by the time the Bill is passed it will probably have to be four in a cell. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will reconsider his attitude, for it would be much better to postpone the operation of the Clause than to have hundreds of 15-year-olds in prisons in present conditions. I hope that he will withdraw the Amendment.

Sir T. Moore: As one of those who helped to defeat the Government on this subject in Committee, I again join forces with the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon). I should like some clarification of what my right hon. Friend means. He has announced a glowing programme of future building of remand homes. As the hon. Lady said, there is now none.
In Committee I related the case of a boy of 16 in my constituency who had undoubtedly misbehaved himself—he had broken into a grocer's shop and had stolen something—who had been committed to borstal. Unfortunately, as frequently happens, there was not a vacancy in the local borstal in Scotland and so he was sent to Barlinnie Prison in Glasgow, which is well known for the hardened criminal class which its inmates compose. Worse still, he was there for two months. How could we expect that boy to emerge from that place without being defiled in both body and character?
Only ten days ago, in my constituency, I was approached by a bus driver who told me a similar tale about his son. I think that his son was a "bit of a lad" and probably deserved something of what he got. He, too, was sentenced to borstal, but again there was no vacancy and he was sent to Barlinnie. Fortunately in time, something was done and he was there for only nine days, but he afterwards boasted to his parents that he was now on practically equal terms


with a murderer who had recently raped and killed a young girl in Greenock.
That is the terrible danger of sending these children to prison, first giving them a sentence of a term in borstal which cannot be implemented and, as an alternative, making them spend their time among the most hardened and sophisticated criminals in Scotland. That is why I join with the hon. Lady in asking my right hon. Friend to reconsider.
My right hon. Friend gave us a comforting picture for the future, but where are these children to go now? It is about that that I want the clarification which I mentioned. Where are the places to which they can be sent without having their lives ruined and destroyed from the contacts which they will make in places like Barlinnie? If my right hon. Friend can reassure me about that, I will support him, but if not I shall again vote against the Government.

Mr. Ede: It is no good carrying anything in Committee against the wishes of the Government, for they will put it right when the Bill comes back to the House. That is what they are trying to do now. It is true that they are putting the Bill right, but they are not putting the service right.
It is appalling to sit in quarter sessions and to have a youth brought up who has been sent to quarter sessions by the magistrates' court to be considered for borstal, only to find that in the intervening period, which may be a considerable time, probably not more than three months, he has been in prison. After all, three weeks is long enough in the circumstances which the hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) related for a great deal of harm to be done.
However, by getting the Amendment carried in Committee, with the help of the hon. Member for Ayr, my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) has at least compelled the Home Secretary to tell us what he hopes to do in the not-too-distant future. But while that programme is being undertaken, the circumstances mentioned by the hon. Member for Ayr will continue. That would be undesirable.
I notice that in Clause 42 (2) the right hon. Gentleman has taken steps to ensure that different dates may be appointed by

order for different purposes of the Act. Can he go as far as saying that he will not bring in this Clause until the accommodation which he has mentioned has been built, so that these difficulties will not arise? That would be one way of lessening the damage which undoubtedly will be done to many young people if he strikes out these words and some day in the not-too-distant future brings in this part of the Act, as it will then be, with the result that many of these children—that is what they really are—will go to prison at as early an age as 15 and may be there for a considerable time.
At any rate, for the time being, such a course of action with regard to these children of 15 and 16 would defeat what he claims—I have no doubt sincerely—to be the main purpose of the Bill, for it will mean children at almost the youngest age mentioned going into prison at a time when prison conditions are not good, even for much older people who go into prison for the first time.

Mr. MacColl: I welcome the programme which the right hon. Gentleman has given us for the provision of these remand centres. As my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) said, perhaps our labours have not been altogether in vain if, because of what we decided at the beginning of December, after an extremely perfunctory and unhelpful programme put forward by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney-General, we have been given a precise programme. That at least is something we have managed to do.
Perhaps I might make a personal remark, having a certain personal interest in this matter. For nine years I was chairman of the managers of the institution which occupied the Ashford premises before they were taken over by the Prison Commissioners. I spent many happy hours in Ashford, not because of the beauty of the building, but because of the delightful character of the boys and girls in it. It has been empty for some time, and it is comforting to know that it is to be brought into some kind of use.
The right hon. Gentleman has shot from underneath himself the basis of his resistance to our proviso, because if he now sees the clear daylight and has a programme laid out the proviso is a reasonable one to operate. The only


ground for resisting it in Committee upstairs was that the Government had no programme and did not believe that they were ever going to get any remand centres.
There are two misconceptions about this argument. One is that we are saying that nobody should go to borstal until there are remand centres. We are not saying that. We are saying that nobody of the age of 15 should go to borstal until there are remand centres. The second point is that we are saying that nobody of the age of 15 should ever go to borstal. We are not even saying that at this stage. We are saying that before this change is made there should be provision for remand centres.
It is not we who are trying to alter the law. For a long time the law has been that children of 15 should not go to borstal. We are not trying to bring in some reform. It is the Government who are trying to produce what I think most people, whether they accept it with some reluctance or not, would agree was a reactionary step and a terrible condemnation of our treatment of delinquency that after all these years we have shamefacedly to say that children of 15 will go into borstal institutions although since they were founded they have been reserved for people of an older age. The Government have come forward with that proposal, and it is for the Government, who want to introduce the change, not to introduce it until they can do so in a balanced way.
6.45 p.m.
An essential part of the idea of reducing the borstal age to 15 is that children of that age should not have to go to borstal, but that remand centres should be available for them. Is it not reasonable to say that before this change is introduced we must implement what has been the law for twelve years, that there should be remand centres? The right hon. Gentleman says that he is not prepared to agree to that, because he thinks it is necessary to have this age for borstal lowered. He has not given any reasons why he takes that view so strongly, but we all recognise that there are difficult children of this young age. We dealt with that in Committee upstairs. We said that until there were closed units in approved schools we would not know the need for borstal for young children.
The reason why the courts are flummoxed and do not know what to do with the youngsters is because all approved schools are open, and it is fortunate that they are, because the atmosphere and training in approved schools should be open. But everybody agrees that closed units in approved schools are necessary for a small minority of children. People have been saying that for years. This is not something which is being said because of the Bill. This is something which everybody who has had experience of the work has said for a long time.
The Government have done nothing about it. It is because they have done nothing that they are in this desperate dilemma. Because they have no closed units in approved schools they have to put 15-year-olds in borstal, and because they have no remand centres they have to put 15-year-olds in prison. That is the point we resisted and objected to in Committee upstairs. Because of the reasonableness of our arguments we persuaded the Committee that that was right, but the Government in their obstinacy will not accept that. This has no party or political current. Something which marries the hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) with my hon. Friend has obviously no party line about it. This is simply a matter of common sense and humanity.
I am sorry that the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney-General is not here. I am sure that he is busy and will not mind my commenting on what he said in Committee upstairs. He rather implied that remanding people in custody was not as dreadful as sentencing them to prison, and therefore it was not really as serious a matter; that it was far more important to keep people out of prison in detention centres than to worry about remand homes.
That is wrong for two reasons. First, quite a substantial proportion of the boys who are remanded for borstal may never go there. They are sometimes remanded to a higher court for a borstal sentence but the appeal committee of quarter sessions may not send them to borstal. The appeal committee may place them on probation, or make some other disposal. Therefore, many of these youngsters who are in prison may not go to borstal.
The second point—and this has not been denied; I asserted this in Committee upstairs and I think it is unchallengeable—is that it is much more difficult to segregate people on remand than convicted people. In the remand wings of prisons there is much less segregation and more likelihood that a young boy or girl who is on remand will be in touch with elderly people, some of whom will have long records. It is less likely to happen if they are under sentence. Young people who are waiting, under sentence, to be sent to a borstal institution, will generally be segregated, but if they are on remand, the fact that they have not yet been sentenced means that they might be rubbing shoulders with people who have a long string of convictions.
I cannot understand how the Home Secretary can fail to see how wrong he is about this, and how fantastic the position is. We have this small problem, which will exist only for a few months, until his programme for remand centres is produced. This problem has faced us for some time, and it is only now that the Government are attempting to deal with it; so it cannot be all that urgent. The right hon. Gentleman is prepared to create a situation in which young people of 15 years of age, who eventually may never go to borstal or even be sentenced to serve in a penal institution of any sort—they may be placed on probation—can be contaminated by being remanded and placed in a wing of a prison and talk to and associate with prisoners—not other young persons or similar borstal candidates, but people with very long records who are also on remand.
I cannot believe that, simply to preserve the authority of the Government and to stop the nonsense of Members in Committee thinking for themselves, the right hon. Gentleman will direct his Whips to see that this proviso is not included and ensure that young boys and girls may still be sent to prison. It is a disgrace.

Mr. V. Yates: I apologise for not having been present when the Home Secretary made his announcement, but I am sure that we all welcome his decision to announce a programme which will avoid keeping young persons

waiting in prison. The hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) asked what we were going to do now about those who are in prison awaiting trial. In Committee I referred to some figures which showed that there were 268 young persons between the ages of 17 and 21 awaiting trial and 555 awaiting transfer to borstal institutions. It is not fair that large numbers of young persons should be placed in this position pending the erection of some new buildings next year, the year after, or some other time in the future. Is it really worth while for the right hon. Gentleman to oppose the opinion expressed by my hon. Friends in Committee, who presented their arguments very carefully?
I have naturally observed the conditions in the local prison in Birmingham. The Home Secretary is well aware that overcrowding in that prison is unprecedented. Recently I found just outside the prison something which I had never known to occur previously. There was a queue of persons outside waiting to visit their relatives, and inside the prison, in any available place where a table could be set up, people were sitting speaking to prisoners. There are still young persons in that prison who are awaiting trial or awaiting a vacancy in a borstal institution.
On 24th February I wrote to the Home Secretary about two persons in this category, and I received his reply only today. One was a boy, aged 15, who was put into Winson Green Prison to await a report. He had to go to the local Dudley Road hospital and back again. I do not understand why he should have been sent to prison. His case has caused consternation and anxiety not only to his parents but to all those in Birmingham who have read about the case. I am still waiting for the right hon. Gentleman's reply to the question I asked him in my letter, namely, why this action was necessary, apart from any question of accommodation. I am told that he is writing to me separately about that part of my letter. We ought to receive replies more promptly on matters of such importance.
The other example also concerned a boy of 15, who had apparently escaped from an approved school. I do not know the full facts, but somebody who knew the boy told me in a letter that


he is paralysed down one side and that one hand and arm are withered. This may account for his fear of approved schools. He would undoubtedly have to undress before other boys, who might be unsympathetic. Most of his trouble may be caused through his trying to escape. Why should he have to wait in prison if the Home Secretary is not prepared to take the necessary action?
I also raised the question of a boy of 19, and the answer I have received in respect of him is that he was put into a cell, in Winson Green Prison, with two other persons who had been involved in difficulty. Eventually this boy had to go on a bread and water diet for two days. He should never have been there. How long must this sort of thing go on? Permanent damage may be done to children of 15, 16 or even 19 years of age who are either waiting for a vacancy to occur in a borstal institution or are on remand, awaiting trial, some of whom may be put in probation in the end.
It is totally wrong. It is not enough to say that we do not have sufficient borstal accommodation. The Home Secretary should not be prepared to put these children in prison, and for that reason I must ask for an assurance from him that this kind of treatment will not continue, because it helps to turn young persons into criminals by influencing them in an absolutely wrong way. I am disappointed in the right hon. Gentleman. Even now I express the hope that he will reconsider his decision.

7.0 p.m.

Mr. Ellis Smith: I want to make one or two observations of an interrogatory character. The first is in regard to the announcement about remand centres, and particularly the one at Risley. Is this the one that was proposed to be built at Hinley Green, about which there was a public inquiry? Is the local authority now completely satisfied with the new site? Can we be told where the new site is and when building will commence?

Mr. R. A. Butler: It may be convenient if I were to say a word or two now in reply to the points that have been raised.
I am not surprised that we have had a certain amount of feeling on this subject, because it is repugnant to most of us

that there has to be any question of remanding young people to prison at all. As one of the main objects of this Bill is to avoid sending people to prison, it is a strange irony that a certain amount of this will have to continue for a short time. I said in my original remarks that this Clause was dealing with offenders for whom borstal provides the only suitable form of training, and we must face that fact. It seems grim that people between the ages of 15 and 16 should have to be sent to borstal, but the fact is that that is the best treatment for them. If there is no other treatment that the court can find, we are in this dilemma: either we say that they should not go where the court thinks they ought to go, but should go to approved schools—in which case we might well have a recurrence of what happened at an approved school not long ago—or we accept that this is the best thing for children of that age.

Mr. MacColl: I did not want to interrupt the right hon. Gentleman so early, because I know that he wants to meet my case, but my case was that, until he provides closed units in approved schools, he cannot say that there are no alternative methods of dealing with them. The courts are still faced with the dilemma which he is creating by not providing closed units.

Mr. Butler: It is not so difficult to provide closed units in approved schools as it is to finish the remand centre programme. One is a comparatively small unit of engineering or building and the other is a big one. I do not think we want to treat approved schools as the only places to which people should go. We must differentiate between borstal and approved schools, even if we are to have security units in approved schools.
My hon. and learned Friend the Joint Under-Secretary and I have visited as many approved schools as we could in the past three years, and we have covered a great number of them. My experience is that we do not want to treat the closed unit within the school as different from the other forms of incarceration and imprisonment. We must try to keep it so. We feel that borstal is the best place for some people of that age who are not suitable for approved schools, and we think that it is a lesser evil to continue to send them to prison on remand for a short time.
We are not trying to restore this for prestige or for any party reason, but simply because we think that it corresponds best with Clause 1 of the Bill in its original form. The hon. Gentleman said that very often remanded children are less segregated than others. I had already made my own inquiries before moving this Amendment, and have since made further inquiries, and the plans which I have discussed with the Prison Commissioners for segregating these children are being most strictly carried out. If it is any consolation to the House, I can give a strict assurance that when children of this age have to be remanded to prison, the plans for segregation will continually be kept in mind and improved from day to day. It is absolutely essential that that should be so, and in my visits to prisons I have been seeing to that myself. I can give a further pledge, as a result of this debate, that while this situation has to continue for the next year or two, segregation shall be real and effective.
The hon. Lady gave the impression that there were going to be hundreds of these cases. We must get this into proportion. I have made inquiries since she spoke, and it appears that at the age of 16 there are only about 240 cases. I should be very surprised if there were 100 cases with which we are dealing here, and there may well be less, between the ages of 15 and 16. If that be sort of statistic following on recent practice, it will be seen that it is a relatively minor issue. It is not a minor issue if one child goes wrong, as the hon. Member for Ladywood (Mr. V. Yates) pointed out, and he has brought forward further cases from the prison which he knows best, and which are very unsatisfactory. Even if one case is wrong, it is extremely bad.
We are not dealing with a very big problem, but with a comparatively small one, and we think that it is essentially these thugs who are precisely the type of young people for whom this type of establishment is not suited. It is not a case of hundreds a year, or, to use the hon. Lady's expression, of four in a cell. It will be a case, in answer to the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl), of proper segregation, which we shall undertake.
A very important point was raised by the right hon. Member for South Shields

(Mr. Ede), who referred to Clause 42 regarding the time factor under which we can operate the introduction of parts of this Bill. I have considered carefully what he said, but I think that my original answer must govern my present answer; namely, we think that children suited to borstal should go that way before we carry on with the operation of the Bill as it is. I will, in return, push on with the remand centre programme as fast as I can.
The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith) asked me particularly about Risley. I will get the latest facts, and either he will agree to put a Question down or I will write to him on the subject. Risley is now progressing, and the cost will be £1 million. It is a very big venture. The cost of adapting Ashford will be something between £2 million and £3 million, which illustrates the size of the programme we have in mind. I am sorry that this programme was not brought in earlier, but we are bringing it up to the level of the detention centre and other programmes. I think that the hon. Member for Widnes was right in saying that some credit must go to the House as a whole, and not only to the Government, for the general interest taken in the subject and the pressure that has been exerted. Those are the answers I wanted to give to the points raised, and I hope we may now come to a decision.

Miss Bacon: I find that reply particularly unconvincing. It seems to me that if only a hundred young people under 15 are put in prison, it is a hundred too many. As the right hon. Gentleman says, this is not just a small problem; even if one, two or even more—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Order. I think that the hon. Lady requires leave of the House to speak again.

Miss Bacon: With the leave of the House, I was saying that this is completely unacceptable. If only one or two go wrong, as the right hon. Gentleman has said, that is very bad indeed; and if it is such a small problem, as he suggested, I do not see why he has to move this Amendment today. He is doing something completely unnecessary if he thinks that it is a small problem. I was


rather distressed to hear him saying that these are borstal boys and boys suitable for borstal. How do we know that they are borstal boys or suitable for borstal?

Mr. R. A. Butler: I should like to correct any impression that I might have given. I was basing it on the decision of the court. I do not want to stigmatise anyone; I was saying only if the court so decides.

Miss Bacon: Even if the court so decides, one of the problems at present is that without remand centres, where these young people can be observed, it is very difficult for the court to decide whether they should go to approved school or to borstal.

Mr. Gordon Walker: They are in prison.

Miss Bacon: As my right hon. Friend says, they are in prison, before even the higher court can decide whether they

should go to borstal or not, and it seems that the whole position is extremely unsatisfactory.

With regard to approved schools, we have had many communications from headmasters of approved schools to the effect that they would rather have provision in their schools for dealing with their type of person rather than have this position of transfer to borstal, which comes under a later Clause in the bill.

In view of the very unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I feel that we must vote against this Amendment, because we feel very strongly about it. I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman is persisting with the Amendment.

Question put, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill:—

The House divided: Ayes 132, Noes 205.

Division No. 133.]
AYES
[7.12 p.m.


Abse, Leo
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)


Ainsley, William
Hamilton, William (West Fife)
Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Hart, Mrs. Judith
Pentland, Norman


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Hayman, F. H.
Popplewell, Ernest


Awbery, Stan
Henderson, Rt. Hn. Arthur(RwlyRegis)
Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)


Bacon, Miss Alice
Herbison, Miss Margaret
Proctor, W. T.


Benson, Sir George
Hill, J. (Midlothian)
Pursey, Cmdr. Harry


Boyden, James
Holman, Percy
Randall, Harry


Braddock, Mrs. E. M.
Holt, Arthur
Rankin, John


Brockway, A. Fenner
Houghton, Douglas
Reid, William


Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)
Howell, Charles A.
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)


Callaghan, James
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)


Chetwynd, George
Hunter, A. E.
Ross, William


Cliffe, Michael
Hynd, H. (Accrington)
Short, Edward


Collick, Percy
Hynd, John (Attercliffe)
Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)
Slater, Mrs. Harriet (Stoke, N.)


Crosland, Anthony,
Jenkins, Roy (Stechford)
Slater, Joseph (Sedgefield)


Crossman, R. H. S.
Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, s.)
Small, William


Cullen. Mrs. Alice
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)


Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)
Sorensen, R. W.


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.
Spriggs, Leslie


Deer, George
Lee, Frederick (Newton)
Steele, Thomas


Dempsey, James
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)
Swingler, Stephen


Diamond, John
Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)


Dodds, Norman
Lipton, Marcus
Taylor, John (West Lothian)


Ede, Rt. Hon. C.
Loughlin, Charles
Wade, Donald


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson
Wainwright, Edwin


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
MacColl, James
Warbey, William


Evans, Albert
McInnes, James
Weitzman, David


Fitch, Alan
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Wells, Percy (Faversham)


Fletcher, Eric
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


Foot, Dingle (Ipswich)
Manuel, A. C.
White, Mrs. Eirene


Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.
Whitlock, William


Forman, J. C.
Millan, Bruce
Wilcock, Group Capt. C. A. B.


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Mitchison, G. R.
Wilkins, W. A.


Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. Hugh
Moody, A. S.
Willey, Frederick


George, LadyMeganLloyd(Crmrthn)
Moore, Sir Thomas (Ayr)
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.
Moyle, Arthur
Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)


Gourlay, Harry
Mulley, Frederick
Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)


Greenwood, Anthony
Neal, Harold
Yates, Victor (Ladywood)


Grey, Charles
Oliver, G. H.
Zilliacus, K.


Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Oram, A. E.



Grimond, J.
Oswald, Thomas
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)
Owen, Will
Mr. Lawson and Mr. Redhead




NOES


Agnew, Sir Peter
Gough, Frederick
Peel, John


Allason, James
Grant-Ferris, Wg Cdr. R.
Peyton, John


Arbuthnot, John
Green, Alan
Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth


Balniel, Lord
Gresham Cooke, R.
Pike, Miss Mervyn


Barber, Anthony
Grimston, Sir Robert
Pitt, Miss Edith


Barlow, Sir John
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.
Pott, Percivall


Batsford, Brian
Gurden, Harold
Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch


Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)
Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Bell, Ronald
Harrison, Brian (Maldon)
Prior, J. M. L.


Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)
Prior-Palmer, Brig, Sir Otho


Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gos &amp;amp; Fhm)
Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)
Proudfoot, Wilfred


Bevins, Rt. Hon. Reginald (Toxteth)
Hastings, Stephen
Pym, Francis


Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel
Henderson, John (Cathcart)
Rawlinson, Peter


Bishop, F. P.
Hlley, Joseph
Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin


Black, Sir Cyril
Hill, Mrs. Eveline (Wythenshawe)
Rees, Hugh


Bourne-Arton, A
Hirst, Geoffrey
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Box, Donald
Hobson, John
Renton, David


Boyle, Sir Edward
Hocking, Philip N.
Ridley, Hon. Nicholas


Browne, Percy (Torrington)
Holland, Philip
Roberts, Sir Peter (Heeley)


Bryan, Paul
Hollingworth, John
Roots, William


Buck, Antony
Hopkins, Alan
Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard


Bullard, Denys
Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)
Russell, Ronald


Bullus, Wing Commander Eric
Hughes-Young, Michael
Shaw, M.


Butcher, Sir Herbert
Hulbert, Sir Norman
Shepherd, William


Butler, Rt.Hn.R.A.(Saffron Walden)
Hurd, Sir Anthony
Skeet, T. H. H.


Campbell, Sir David (Belfast, S.)
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'rd &amp;amp; Chiswick)


Campbell, Gordon (Moray &amp;amp; Nairn)
Iremonger, T. L.
Smyth, Brig. Sir John (Norwood)


Cary, Sir Robert
Jackson, John
Spearman, Sir Alexander


Channon, H. P. G,
James, David
Speir, Rupert


Chichester-Clark, R.
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)
Stevens, Geoffrey


Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Stodart, J. A.


Cleaver, Leonard
Kerans, Cdr. J. S.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm


Cole, Norman
Kershaw, Anthony
Storey, Sir Samuel


Cooke, Robert
Leburn, Gilmour
Studholme, Sir Henry


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry
Sumner, Donald (Orpington)


Cordle, John
Lindsay, Martin
Talbot, John E.


Corfield, F. V.
Linstead, Sir Hugh
Tapsell, Peter


Costain, A. P.
Litchfield, Capt. John
Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)


Coulson, J. M.
Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Teeling, William


Craddock, Sir Beresford
McAdden, Stephen
Temple, John M.


Critchley, Julian
MacArthur, Ian
Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret


Crowder, F. P.
McLaren, Martin
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)


Cunningham, Knox
Maclean,SirFitzroy(Bute&amp;amp;N.Ayrs.)
Thomas, Peter (Conway)


Currie, G. B. H.
Macleod, Rt. Hn. Iain (Enfield, W.)
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin


Dalkeith, Earl of
McMaster, Stanley R.
Turner, Colin


Dance, James
Maginnis, John E.
Turton, Rt. Hon R. H.


d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R.
van Straubenzee, W. R.


de Ferranti, Basil
Markham, Major Sir Frank
Vane, W. M. F.


Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.
Marten, Neil
Vickers, Miss Joan


Drayson, G. B.
Mathew, Robert (Honiton)
Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis


du Cann, Edward
Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Duncan, Sir James
Mawby, Ray
Walder, David


Eden, John
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Walker, Peter


Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.
Ward, Dame Irene


Elliott, R. W. (Nwcstle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Mills, Stratton
Watts, James


Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn
Montgomery, Fergus
Webster, David


Errington, Sir Eric
More, Jasper (Ludlow)
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Farey-Jones, F. W.
Morrison, John
Whitelaw, William


Farr, John
Nabarro, Gerald
Williams, Dudley (Exeter)


Finlay, Graeme
Neave, Airey
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Fisher, Nigel
Nicholson, Sir Godfrey
Wise, A. R.


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Oakshott, Sir Hendrie
Woodhouse, C. M.


Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)
Osborn, John (Hallam)
Woodnutt, Mark


Gammans, Lady
Osborne, Cyril (Louth)
Woollam. John


Gibson-Watt, David
Page, John (Harrow, West)
Worsley, Marcus


Glover, Sir Douglas
Page, Graham (Crosby)
Yates, William (The Wrekin)


Goodhart, Philip
Partridge, E.



Goodhew, Victor
Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:




Mr. J. E. B. Hill and Mr. Noble.

Clause 2.—(SERIOUS OFFENCES BY CHILDREN AND YOUNG PERSONS.)

Mr. MacColl: I beg to move, in page 2, line 26 to leave out from "mentioned" to the end of line 30 and to insert:
after the words 'grievous bodily harm' there shall be added the words 'or of arson of a dwelling-house with person therein, burglary,

rape, armed robbery, robbery with aggravation, or using firearms with intent to resist apprehension'".
I think I can put very simply to the House the point at issue which is embodied in this Amendment. Clause 2 is very incongruous among the many incongruities which emerge in the Bill


from time to time. This Clause seems very much out of keeping with the general idea of the Bill, which is as far as possible to avoid long sentences of detention for young people.
The Children and Young Persons Act, 1933, provided that, whereas normally children or young persons could be dealt with by magistrates' courts, for certain types of offence, namely, murder and manslaughter, in substitution for sentence to an approved school, or whatever it might be, there would be detention during His Majesty's pleasure, as it then was. Obviously much can be said for that principle. We have already discussed capita] punishment and the essential difference between offences concerned with taking life and other offences. Therefore, one can see the justification for saying that for many reasons it is not desirable that a young person who commits one of the homicidal offences should be dealt with in the ordinary way with other delinquents.
The Bill now proposes to extend that to all offences punishable with imprisonment for fourteen years or more. We discussed this in Committee. Our point was that it is far too wide. I think the words I used were that it is cheating. On the one hand, the Government are saying that they want to cut out long sentences and severely limit the powers of courts to send people to imprisonment for long periods. On the other hand, they are providing this cat-and-mouse procedure under which, in a case in which the sentence could be over fourteen years, a court can pass an indeterminate sentence. Then nobody will know how long it will last. It will not be clear what is to happen to the young person. He will more or less disappear from the public ken and become subject to the administration of the Home Secretary and be under his control. That seems to be a very arbitrary procedure.
The second point is that it is far too wide. There is an extraordinary number of offences of a comparatively trivial kind which can be subject to a sentence of fourteen years' imprisonment. I quoted the example that the abduction of an heiress is punishable with more than fourteen years' imprisonment, but the abduction of the daughter of an ordinary man in the street is not punishable with as much as fourteen years. Therefore, the romantic youth of the future

will have to show considerable discrimination. If they desire to go to Gretna Green with a young lady, they must choose a young lady whose father has not a lot of money, because the Government are very determined to preserve the rights of fathers with property but are not worrying quite so much about the rights of other fathers. Therefore, they provide these arbitrary provisions.
There are other examples which are more frequent. Robbery with violence was mentioned often during our discussions. Robbery with violence may be quite a serious matter, but in many cases with young people it is not at all serious. It almost becomes a matter of bullying. It can be anything from snatching a friend's hat and throwing it into the canal to a couple of boys holding up another boy and demanding twopence from him. On the other hand, it may be very serious.
In our opinion, the Clause is far too wide. The test which the Government have applied of simply taking the maximum sentence gives far too much discretion. In a Bill which is designed to restrict the detention of young people, as far as possible, and which goes into great detail in limiting the discretion of courts in the sentences they can impose, it is quite absurd to give this sweeping power and discretion to the Executive as opposed to the judiciary. It is altogether wrong.
We discussed this at considerable length in Committee, and a decision was arrived at which we did not very much like. I do not want to go on re-fighting the same battle. In a spirit of considerable reason we have tried to meet what we think the Government feel about this. Instead of having this rather wide collection of offences, it seems to us to be desirable to try to select particularly gross offences and name them specifically in the Bill rather than to limit it to sentences.
Another good reason for doing this is that the Streatfeild Committee suggests in paragraph 91 of its Report that it should be possible for a number of offences which at present come within the provisions of the Clause to be dealt with by magistrates' courts. That is another indication that it is extremely difficult by the definition of an offence to measure its seriousness. Therefore, in order to try to meet what the Government have in mind, we have selected offences which


seem to be the kind of offences which the Government might reasonably want to be dealt with in this way.
We have selected
arson of a dwelling house with person therein
because, although arson in one form or another is not an uncommon juvenile offence, if young people start setting fire to a house in which people are asleep it is not something to be encouraged. In fact, it could constitute a very serious danger to life. We have cut out ordinary straightforward housebreaking, but we specify burglary because that includes the element of coming at night and causing considerable alarm and apprehension to innocent people in their homes. We have included rape, armed robbery, robbery with aggravation, and using firearms with intent to resist apprehension. Those seem to us to be the main offences which the Government might reasonably say are comparable with the original offences which were put into the 1933 Act.
We suggest that the Government should accept the idea of the 1933 Act of picking out specific offences, if they want to extend them, and not have this general provision covering any offence which in its most extreme form is punishable by fourteen years' imprisonment, because it would be possible to bring into operation what is, on the face of it, this very undesirable way of dealing with some offences. In this country we have always set our face very firmly against indeterminate sentences. We have always taken the view that a man who is convicted and sentenced should know just how long that sentence will last. We want to keep to that as far as possible. To keep this Clause in its present form seems to us to be thoroughly undesirable so I hope that, very much as a compromise, the Government will accept the Amendment.

7.30 p.m.

The Attorney-General (Sir Reginald Manningham-Buller): I have listened with interest to the arguments of the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) in support of the Amendment, but I am afraid that I shall have to disappoint him by saying that they do not convince us that acceptance of his Amendment would improve the Clause. Indeed, in our view it would have the contrary effect.
I thought that I explained to the Standing Committee the object of the Clause, a matter on which the hon. Gentleman has touched. It is, of course, the intention of the Clause to enlarge the scope of Section 53 of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933, so as to enable the courts, in appropriate cases, to order that the child or young person be liable to be detained during Her Majesty's pleasure, and, in that case
… liable to be detained in such place and under such conditions as the Secretary of State may direct.
It follows from that that we hope that the courts will not find it necessary to make much use of these provisions.
At the same time, we feel it necessary that the courts should have this power in relation to particularly grave and heinous offences. The object of the Amendment is to put forward a different criterion of the offences that are to be embraced within the Clause. As the Bill now stands, the power will inure to the courts where the maximum sentence for the offence is fourteen years or more. The Amendment proposes instead that there should be specific reference to the offences named in it.
The hon. Member has argued that some of the offences resulting in charges which, on conviction, could carry a maximum sentence of fourteen years may be very trivial. That is true, of course, but the same argument applies to some of the offences detailed in the Amendment. The hon. Gentleman gave the instance of the offence of robbery which, as he has just said, and as he said in Committee, might be committed by a small boy who threw another small boy's school cap into the river. The offence of robbery with aggravation might be committed by a schoolboy robber who used a toy pistol to hold up his victim; he might be guilty of armed robbery and, if he joined forces with another boy, he would be guilty of robbery with aggravation.
Whatever the kind of offence charged, the gravity of the offence will ordinarily differ tremendously in degree. The hon. Gentleman emphasised that, and we accept it. It is because we accept it that we think it right to draw the line as we have drawn it, and to leave it to the discretion of the courts to use this power only in the grave cases. We think that it should be left to the discretion of the


courts to determine when the case was of such gravity that this kind of sentence was the only sentence that could properly be passed—and, of course, there is always the power of appeal against sentence.
I would point out, however, that the subsection applies only where the child or young person is convicted on indictment. That means that the only offence for which a child could be dealt with under Section 53 (2) of the Act of 1933, as amended by this Bill, would be manslaughter. A young person—that is to say, someone who has attained the age of 14 but is not yet 17—may, with his consent, be dealt with summarily for any indictable offence other than homicide. In practice, the great majority are tried in this way, although, naturally, the proportions vary according to the offence. A juvenile or other magistrates' court would thus have no reason to commit a young person for trial on indictment for a comparatively trivial offence.
Secondly, it is true to say that the courts are well accustomed to adjusting their sentences to the circumstances of the offence and the offender in each case, and I have no reason to doubt that the courts will use the discretion that this Clause will give them—will use with discretion the extension of their power to impose long periods of detention for grave crimes committed by young persons, especially as Section 53 (2) of the 1933 Act expressly provides that the power to impose detention can be exercised only where the court is of the opinion that the case is such that none of the other methods will be useful—

Mr. Leslie Hale: Roughly, how many offences now exist for which a sentence of fourteen years or more can be imposed? I think that some of the sentences have gone—piracy on the high seas and arson at the Royal Dockyards have gone. The list must be very diverse.

The Attorney-General: During the Committee proceedings I gave a complete list of all the offences. I do not have it with me now, but it is a fairly diverse list.
I would say that although we are enlarging the scope of Section 53, it is giving what might be called a reserve power to the courts which I think is not likely to be exercised often. However, when we are making other changes in the Bill, I think that it is desirable to give the courts this reserve power to deal with the exceptionally grave case—

Mr. Hale: Is not the right hon. and learned Gentleman not too modest? He was in course of convincing me by his eloquence rather more than he convinced his hon. Friends. He was on the road to that desirable end.

The Attorney-General: The hon. Gentleman is encouraging me to prolong my speech, but that might not be entirely acceptable to others on that side of the House, and, in particular, to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Charles A. Howell), whom we are delighted to have with us on this occasion, although on this occasion we may not hear his views.
That is the argument for this Clause as it now stands, and against this Amendment. The hon. Member for Widnes said that we have always set our face very firmly against indeterminate sentences. That is not quite true; the sentence to borstal is indeterminate, and some of the other provisions of the Bill enlarge the power to impose indeterminate sentences. I think that there is something to be said, particularly in relation to children and young persons, where the powers under the Bill of sentencing are thought to be inadequate, for the courts to be able to say, "This is a particularly grave case. Our powers, as they stand, are really not sufficient. We shall exercise the power we have under Section 53 of the Children and Young Persons Act and order you to be detained during Her Majesty's pleasure"—and I would emphasise the words
…under such conditions as the Secretary of State may direct.
He can therefore alter those conditions according to the behaviour of the young person.
I commend the Clause to the House as it stands. For the reasons I have given, I do not think that it would be improved by the Amendment.

Amendment negatived.

Clause 4.—(DETENTION OF OFFENDERS AGED 14 TO 20.)

Amendment made: In page 4, line 18, leave out from "person" to second "a" and insert "who is serving or has served".—[Mr. Renton.]

Clause 10.—(MINIMUM AGE FOR ATTENDANCE CENTRE.)

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 7, line 45, at the end to insert:
(2) The aggregate number of hours for which a person may be required to attend at an attendance centre by virtue of an order under the said section nineteen—

(a) shall not be less than twelve except where he is under fourteen years of age and the court is of opinion, having regard to his age or any other circumstances, that twelve hours would be excessive; and
(b) shall not exceed twelve except where the court is of opinion, having regard to all the circumstances, that twelve hours would be inadequate, and in that case shall not exceed twenty-four hours.

(3) An order shall not be made under the said section nineteen unless the court is satisfied that the attendance centre to be specified in the order is reasonably accessible to the person concerned, having regard to his age, the availability of public transport and any other circumstances.
This Amendment fulfils an undertaking which I gave in Committee to consider increasing the maximum number of hours at attendance centres and several other matters of detail which were mentioned in connection with attendance centres. The new subsection (2) increases the maximum number of hours which may be awarded from 12 to 24 in a way which I will explain in detail in a moment. The new subsection (3) requires the court to ensure that an attendance centre is reasonably accessible for the child offender.
Several suggestions were made in Committee concerning the maximum number of hours which should be spent at an attendance centre. Some hon. Members felt that the maximum should be increased to 24 hours and others suggested 30 hours. Having given the matter careful thought, we think that it would be right to double the present maximum, which has tended to become the standard sentence. We therefore think that the maximum should be 24 hours.
The hon. and learned Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) suggested that, in order

to avoid the new maximum becoming a standard sentence, it should be qualified by some phrase. He suggested two qualifications—"in special circumstances" and "where it is expedient". We accept his suggestion in principle and therefore suggest that the words in subsection (2, b) should be inserted. They provide that a period of more than 12 hours' attendance shall be awarded only if "the court is of opinion, having regard to all the circumstances, that twelve hours would be inadequate."
We also felt it right to consider whether there should be a minimum period of attendance. We consider it best to make 12 hours the minimum. Incidentally, it will no doubt tend to become the standard if courts follow the wording of our proposal, except when the offender is a child under 14 years and the court thinks that, in view of his age or other circumstances, 12 hours' attendance would be excessive. That is achieved by paragraph (a) of subsection (2).
The terms of subsection (3) of the Amendment, dealing with accessibility, are self-explanatory. They are of special importance in the case of very young offenders, bearing in mind that we are lowering the age from 12 to 10 years. We will bring to the notice of the courts what the Ingleby Committee stated in paragraph 291 of its Report about the distances which children under 12 years might be expected to travel. We believe that the courts will not have difficulty in interpreting the Clause if it is amended in the two ways that I have suggested.

7.45 p.m.

Mr. Hale: Will the hon. and learned Gentleman tell us what is the meaning of "reasonably accessible" in subsection (3) of the Amendment? As this is a day on which someone has just done about 12,000 miles in an hour, and in view of the varied forms of transport which are available even in Lancashire, may I ask what the words "reasonably accessible" mean? As it is possible to send a lad to an attendance centre every Saturday for four to five weeks, surely there should be some definition of these words in the Bill. Surely some guidance should be given somewhere. Surely we should have some idea of what time is to be expended in carrying out this curious sort of sentence.

Mr. Renton: The hon. Gentleman is a lawyer, and he knows very well that the interpretation of "reasonably accessible" will be a matter for the courts in the light of the circumstances. However, it may be of assistance to the hon. Gentleman if I say that, up to the present, for those of 12 years and over the courts have taken (he view, which has been supported by the Home Office—we are responsible for running the attendance centres, although we get others to do it for us—that anything up to 10 miles can be regarded as reasonably accessible, but not in all cases. It depends on public transport. In any case where the child's parents cannot afford the fare by public transport to the attendance centre, then whoever is running the attendance centre has a discretion to pay the fare and to charge it against the Home Office.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I take it that it will be convenient to discuss the two Amendments to the Amendment, namely, in line 3 to leave out paragraph (a), and in line 6 to leave out from "exceed" to "twenty-four" in line 8, and to vote on them if necessary and then vote on the original Question.

Mr. MacColl: Subject to what the Joint Under-Secretary of State may say, I should like to move the Amendment in line 3 at some stage. In view of the lateness of the hour and the desirability of every hon. Member to proceed with the Bill as quickly as possible and to show that we on this side approach the matter in a helpful and not an obstructive way, I do not wish to move the Amendment in line 6.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Then I take it that it will be convenient to proceed to the Amendment in line 3.

Mr. MacColl: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Amendment, to leave out paragraph (a).
I do not wish to deal with the general problem of the new proposals but to confine myself to the one question of making 12 hours the minimum sentence. I know that this matter was hinted at by the Ingleby Committee, although it did not make a recommendation. It hedged about on it. Ingleby Committee or no Ingleby Committee, I know that I speak for many magistrates—I do not pretend that I necessarily speak for many hon. Members—when I say that

they are very much against this limit on the discretion of the courts. At a time when everyone is desperately worried about the problems of juvenile delinquency and the best way to deal with them, I just cannot understand why there is this passion for limiting the discretion of the courts. The courts have often referred to their lack of power and discretion.
In quite a number of cases 12 hours may seem to be excessive. In London, it takes something like three months to finish a 12-hour detention. That is assuming that all goes according to plan. If, however, a boy should be ill or if, possibly, his parents go on holiday and he has to go with them, it may take even longer. Normally, however, the 12 hours occupies about three months.
Many magistrates have been shocked at that—I speak for my colleagues in the London courts—when they have made a detention centre order for, perhaps, 12 hours, under the impression that it will take about three or four weeks, and then they discover that three months later the unfortunate boy still has to trot down to do his couple of hours on a Saturday. That is one objection. Although in some cases one would like to use a period of more than 12 hours, in many cases one wants to use less.
The other point which seems wholly to escape the Secretary of State is that in sentencing, it is sometimes important to have different sentences for different people, because of different degrees of culpability, behaviour and all the rest. The more that we limit the discretion of the court by having a fixed arbitrary standard, the less easy it is to do that.
To give an illustration, several boys might be charged with an offence. One of them might be on probation. In another case, there might be a conditional discharge which has been broken by the subsequent offence. Another may be a boy without any previous offences. Courts generally feel the importance—certainly, I do—of taking breaches of conditional discharges seriously. It is no use asking a boy to promise to behave himself if, when he does not behave himself, nothing happens. It does not help him to think that promises do not matter. Therefore, quite often, when the terms of a conditional discharge have been broken, one


wants to be able to put the boy up and to say, "When you were here two months ago, you promised that you would behave. You have not behaved. Therefore, we will punish you for the original offence, as we said we would".
There are only two things that could be done. One is to use the attendance centre and the other is to impose a fine. I supported the Government when they proposed to increase the maximum fine, because I am not at all against the use of fines in appropriate cases. There are, however, a number of boys who are still at school who cannot afford to pay heavy fines and who cannot afford to pay fines without, in many cases, inflicting hardship on their families. That is the kind of discretion which the magistrates should be allowed. They, and not the Home Office, are the people best qualified to judge whether a fine or an attendance centre is the appropriate penalty in a particular case. That is why we have magistrates. If we do not give them that discretion, we are wasting our time in having juvenile courts. We might as well do the whole thing administratively.
Therefore, it is reasonable that occasionally, juvenile courts should feel that in particular cases a fine is unsuitable but that they would like to use the attendance centre treatment as a method of fixing a penalty appropriate to the offence. One boy might have broken a condition of discharge and, at the same time, have a bad school report. Another boy who has broken the condition may have a good school report. The magistrates might wish to vary the number of hours of attendance. Flexibility of that kind would be an enormous help to courts in wrestling with the difficult problems of the young, which are specialised and difficult things to do.
Therefore, magistrates cannot understand the passion of the Home Secretary to make matters more difficult for them. Every time that an arbitrary limit is imposed upon their discretion, it is more difficult for the magistrates, who are in the front line, faced with the human problems of the parents and children who come before them, to try to see that justice is done. The way that magistrates discharge these responsibilities might be criticised, but it is not

helping them to deal with delinquency if they are not given discretion.
There are two ways in which magistrates would be enormously helped. My proposal is to delete paragraph (a). The alternative would be to extend the discretion which now applies to a boy under 14 to boys over 14—in other words, not to have the age limit.
I plead with the Under-Secretary not to make things more difficult. To be frank, I believe that it is easier to get the ear of the Secretary of State if one is on the administrative side of this problem rather than on the judicial side. I can understand that anybody running an attendance centre likes to have everything beautifully phased and planned, with people coming in and out at the right time; that makes it much easier for those doing the job. There is, however, the viewpoint of the courts who have to hold the scales of justice evenly.

Mr. John Hobson: I intervene for only a moment or two to express my thanks and gratitude to my hon. and learned Friend the Under-Secretary for his Amendment. I was one of those who spoke in Committee about attendance centres, which I regard as an important new experiment which should be given every possible consideration to allow for their proper development. I certainly spoke in favour of extending the total number of hours in the maximum case to 30, but I said at the time that I did not see any great difference in principle between a maximum of 24 or 30 hours. I regret that my hon. and learned Friend has not seen his way to make it 30 hours, because when providing for a maximum we ought always to provide for the very worst case, even though the maximum may not frequently be used.
I am glad that in paragraph (b) of the new subsection (2), my hon. and learned Friend has left the magistrates a substantial discretion. As I read the provisions of paragraph (b), the court can form its own opinion having regard to all the circumstances of the case, which means that it can do exactly as it pleases and that it does not have to have regard to special circumstances, which would mean something completely different. Therefore, so far as there is discretion between 12 and 24 hours, my reading of the Amendment is that


courts will have complete and absolute discretion.
I am in substantial sympathy and agreement with the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) about the limitations on the discretion of the court below 12 hours. Normally, it is advantageous to leave the courts as wide a discretion as possible. If we are fixing a minimum sentence, it must be upon the basis that it is not worth sending anybody to such a sentence unless he is sent for that minimum. I would have supposed that it was worth sending people to attendance centres for a minimum of, say, six hours. It would be absurd to send them for only one or two hours—that would be a waste of time—but if we are to have a minimum figure, it could have been substantially less than 12 hours, unless my hon. and learned Friend has substantial reasons for saying that that is the only basis upon which people should go to attendance centres.
Generally, however, I welcome the Amendment. I hope that it will draw the attention of the courts to the availability and use that can be made of attendance centres, that these centres will be provided much more widely throughout the country and that very many more people will have this treatment as a first step towards their reformation.

8.0 p.m.

Miss Bacon: I welcome the Amendment, which follows the lines of Amendments which we moved in Committee. We were then rather concerned to reduce the age from 12 to 10 as a safeguard against long distances which might have to be covered. We were concerned about the distances to be travelled. I would reiterate what I said in Committee, that it is not only the number of miles or the availability of public transport that matter but the kind of area into which these very young boys will be required to go. We have in Leeds an attendance centre which is on one side of the city centre, and I should not like to think that any young boys of 10 or 11 had to come from outside the city on a Saturday afternoon and then have to cross the city to get to the attendance centre on the other side even though the distance to be covered might be only four or five miles. I assume, therefore, that steps will be taken to see that this consideration is provided for in any instructions which are issued. We thank the hon.

and learned Gentleman, because we were concerned about these very young people travelling not only long distances but across big cities where they may get into more harm than if they stay at home.
We thank him, too, for increasing the number of hours from 12 to 24. I believe that anything which keeps children out of residential institutions is to be welcomed. In so far as hours are extended, that may mean that young people may be able to go to attendance centres rather than be sent to approved schools, and that is very welcome. During the last eighteen months, I have seen a good many of the institutions for children and young people, and while quite a lot of those I have seen are well run and good in themselves, I still Chink that anything which keeps children out of them is to be welcomed as, on the whole, residential institutions create, perhaps, as many problems as they solve.
Although there are only a few of them, I believe that the attendance centres are doing very good work, and I hope they will be extended. Some of them, like those in Leeds and Liverpool, have a liaison scheme whereby some children voluntarily can go during week nights as well as on Saturday afternoons. I am sorry that we have not had the opportunity to discuss a new Clause put down by my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede), which followed a suggestion made by Sir Basil Henriques a short time ago for training centres. It may be that, out of the attendance centres and the juvenile liaison schemes they have, we may get something on the lines envisaged for the training centres.
I welcome the Amendment because although we are increasing the hours we may by so doing keep some children out of residential institutions.

Sir G. Benson: I apologise for not having heard the hon. and learned Gentleman move the Amendment. I should like to ask one or two questions. Originally 12 hours was the maximum. Now it is to become the minimum, with 24 hours as the maximum. Has the hon. and learned Gentleman any facts to offer us about the results of these attendance centres? Has he, for example, the re-conviction rate? Has he any idea of the type of lad who is successful and of the type who is unsuccessful? Has he any


information about whether the number of hours of attendance is in any way related to failure or success? So far as I know, there is no information at all available, except possibly to the Home Office, on what the centres are achieving or have achieved—or on whether they are achieving anything. Before I could feel inclined to accept as the minimum what was the maximum or to accept doubling the maximum, I should Ike some evidence that they are effective.

Mr. Renton: I am afraid that I have not the statistical information for which the hon. Gentleman asks. Indeed, I do not know whether it exists in any precise terms. Various people have given their impressions. I remember that in Committee my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Hobson), whose intervention just now I welcomed, put forward the view, if I remember rightly, that the longer the number of hours of attendance at attendance centres the greater the chances of success in preventing further crime on the part of the offenders, but I think that that was only a general impression he had gained, and I do not know of any specific evidence. I will try to find it and, if it is available, to give it to the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Sir G. Benson).

Mr. Hobson: The point I was making then was that the longer the hours it is possible to send convicted persons to attendance centres, the more of them could go there instead of to borstal or a detention centre for very much more severe sentences.

Miss Bacon: Perhaps the Joint Under-Secretary of State is not aware of the fact that there are figures available about the Leeds attendance centre particularly for the juvenile liaison scheme in connection with it. In the six years in which the juvenile liaison scheme has been run, a total of 2,164 children have come to the notice of the juvenile liaison officers before they have appeared in court, and of those 194, only 9 per cent., have committed any further offence, and some of those offences have been quite minor, such as cycling offences, which shows that the juvenile liaison scheme, at any rate, has a success rate which is very high.

Sir G. Benson: I was talking about the attendance centres, not the juvenile liaison schemes. That is what I am interested in.

Mr. Renton: I am most grateful to the hon. Lady, and with respect to her, although I am grateful for any intervention of the constructive kind she makes, I do not think she has given the information for which the hon. Gentleman the Member for Chesterfield was asking.
However, I can tell the House that the Institute of Criminology has undertaken research into the results of the working of the attendance centres and the result of that research is shortly to be published. I understand that one of the conclusions which it has drawn is that the hours possible at attendance centres could be increased. In other words, the research which it has undertaken would be in support of the proposal in this Amendment.
I am grateful for the support which has been given to our attempt in paragraph (b) of this new subsection (2) to prevent the new maximum of 24 hours from becoming the standard, an expression of the hope which was expressed by the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) in Committee.
I am also glad that the hon. Lady appreciates that we are making a conscious attempt to ensure that young children are not sent too far to attendance centres. I agree most fully with her that it would be unwise to attempt to lay down any specific distances.
The hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) referred to the importance of letting the courts have discretion in some matters. This is a matter in which, I think, they may very well be best left to use their own discretion.
The only point of substantial disagreement on what I have put forward in this debate so far has come from the hon. Gentleman the Member for Widnes. I listened with respect to the views he put forward. Without any commitment whatever, I will undertake to look at this point again. We have to face the fact that the Ingleby Committee considered that if we lowered the age from 12 to 10 then it might be feasible to have shorter hours, but the clear implication of what


the Committee said was that, apart from that factor, it was best to leave it at what had become the standard. That is what this new paragraph (a) does. It is a matter of interpreting what the Ingleby Committee says.

Mr. MacColl: I am dealing with a statement of facts and not a matter of interpretation. I say that it has not become standard practice. I speak from experience in London only, and I certainly frequently make orders for a period of much less than 12 hours.

Mr. Renton: The hon. Member's experience does not appear to have been characteristic and does not conform with the information that we have in the Home Office.
Those who are responsible for running the centres have found, as the Ingleby Committee has recorded, that generally speaking attendances of only four to six hours are not worth very much. It was with these factors in mind that we decided that, except for those under 14 years of age, 12 hours should be made the minimum and indeed it was to be regarded as the normal standard for those of all ages who were qualified to receive sentence of attendance at attendance centres. Nevertheless, in view of what the hon. Member has said about fettering the discretion of the courts, I will undertake, without commitment, to consider the matter further.
I do not accept what the hon. Member said—and they were rather wild words—about the Home Office always attempting to fetter the discretion of the courts. It is very rarely, and it is very rarely in the Bill, that we have attempted to fetter the discretion of the courts. However, if ultimately there appears to be no good reason for doing so on this occasion we will amend this provision further.

Mr. MacColl: In view of what the hon. and learned Gentleman has said, and not withdrawing a word of what I said, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment in the hope that something will happen in another place.

Amendment to the proposed Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Proposed words there inserted in the Bill.

Clause 14.—(RELEASE AND SUPERVISION.)

Miss Bacon: I beg to move, in page 9, line 23, at the end to insert:
(2) It shall be the duty of the managers to review the circumstances of a person detained in the school at the end of every six months of the period of detention in order to decide whether he should be released.
The managers of an approved school exercise all the rights and duties of parents. One of these very important rights is to review the circumstances of the child and to decide when the child should come out on licence. It was shown at the time of the Carlton Approved School inquiry that the managers there had not been carrying out their duties in the manner in which it was intended they should do. We want to make clear here that every child shall have his circumstances reviewed to decide whether or not he shall go out on licence at the end of every six months.
I know that Rule 40 of the Approved School Rules says that this shall be reviewed towards the end of the first year in the school and thereafter as often as may be necessary or at least quarterly. I am not sure how far the Approved School Rules are as legal as anything that would be written into the Bill. We feel therefore that it would be much more satisfactory to write this provision into the Bill rather than to leave it in the rules. In any case the rules make provision only for review at the end of the first year.

8.15 p.m.

Mr. Renton: We agree with the object of the Amendment. Clearly the managers should have the duty to review periodically the progress of each child with a view to seeing whether and when he is fit for release on licence. As the hon. Lady pointed out, this object has been achieved in practice for 28 years now by means of the Approved School Rules of 1933 which are still in force. Rule 40 requires a review to be held towards the end of the first year and thereafter as often as may be necessary and at least quarterly. We propose to amend that rule as soon as Clause 14 becomes law by providing for the first review to be held at the end of the first six months, as suggested by the Amendment, instead of at the end of the first year. As the hon. Lady will realise, when this is done the review will be


held more frequently than it would be if the Amendment were accepted.
The question is whether it is right to do this by rule or by writing it into the statute. We feel that the established practice of dealing with this matter by rules instead of by statute has certain advantages, chief of which is that the Home Secretary can prescribe in more detail than would be appropriate in a statute the way in which the duties should be carried out. Another advantage is that it gives greater flexibility and therefore greater ease of amendment to meet changing circumstances.

Mr. Weitzman: What is the binding effect of the rules supposing that the management does not carry them out? That is the important point.

Mr. Renton: I understand that the binding effect is that if a manager failed to carry out a rule he could be directed by the Home Secretary to do so. That is how the matter would be handled. Therefore, it will be seen that the binding effect of the rule is just the same as if this were done by statute. I hope for these reasons that I carry the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) with me in feeling that this is the best way of doing it. We have the advantage of twenty years' experience in doing it this way. It has not given rise to difficulties and we feel that it would be better than writing it into the Bill.

Mr. Ede: I think that the Joint Under-Secretary's account of what has happened in the past is a little too flattering to the management of some of these schools. Certainly at Stanton a few years ago and at Carlton House these provisions were not carried out. Whilst I should like to see the rules continued. I think that there should be greater insistence by the Secretary of State on their being complied with. I should regret to see it being regarded as sufficient if this assessment of the advance of the boys in their work at an approved school was done only at the four meetings during the year.
The headmaster should be encouraged to submit reports whenever in his view a boy is suitable for consideration in this matter, even if it does not happen just before one of the quarterly meetings. The failure of managers to deal properly

with this matter is the cause of more misconduct and ill-feeling in the schools than anything else. On one occasion before the war, boys at Stanton who had a grudge against the headmaster lay in wait for him but instead of his coming along it turned out to be one of the assistant masters, who was shot on the spot.
It was believed in that case that one of the boys was being retained because he had been so helpful in the school as almost to amount to an unpaid teacher, and certainly a very high-grade monitor. Things like that should be very carefully watched by the Secretary of State's inspectors when they visit the schools in order to make certain that these matters are discussed at managers' meetings—probably at every managers' meeting—and that there should always be a report from the headmaster on the progress of any boy who appeared to have qualified himself for consideration for release.
To my mind, if we are to have good relationships in the school between the pupils and the staff this matter must be one of the highest concerns of both the staff and the managers, and the managers must be known to intervene. One of the problems at Carlton House was that the managers really did very little at all in this matter and it was entirely left to the staff. This is a very important matter, and to get good feeling into a school the proper working of these rules is a matter that must always give the Secretary of State great concern.

Mr. Weitzman: I very strongly agree with the remarks which have just been made by my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede). It seems to me that this is a matter of paramount importance. The headmaster must have a proper regard for the boys, and the managers must take the keenest possible interest so that no boy is retained who has reached the stage when he ought to be released.
I appreciate that the rules are very good, and it sounds as though, if put into practice and applied properly, they will do what we think is appropriate in the circumstances. One of the advantages of writing something into the Bill would be that it would be obligatory, but I recognise that if one applies the rules and the Home Office


pays proper attention, by means of inspection, to the enforcement of the rules, the matter can be properly achieved in that way.
I hope that regard will be had to what has been said, and that the keenest possible attention will be devoted to ensuring that the rules are carried out in the proper manner.

Mr. Renton: The right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) has said, and I fully agree with him, that the managers should review the cases as often as possible; and the right hon. Gentleman is supported by his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman), and, I am sure, by all hon. Members. I think I should point out that if we stick to the rules and amend them in the way I have suggested, there will be an obligation to review more frequently than if we accept the Amendment. That ought to be made absolutely clear.
There is one respect in which I regret to say I may have misled the House. I was asked how the rules are enforced. The sanction is, technically, not the giving of a direction by the Home Secretary but the more drastic sanction of withdrawing his certificate of approval. That would be the case also if the Amendment were accepted. There is, of course, nothing to prevent anybody from complaining to the Home Secretary if he wishes to bring it to the Home Secretary's notice that the managers are not fulfilling their duty under the rules, and that is, indirectly, a further sanction.
With those factors in mind, perhaps the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) will agree with me that our best plan is to amend the rules as soon as Clause 14 becomes law.

Miss Bacon: I fully agree that if, as the hon. and learned Gentleman says, the new rules are to provide for review at the end of the first six months and then every quarter, cases will be reviewed more frequently than under the Amendment. However, I am not very clear about the legality of the rules. Will there be as much legal standing under the rules as there would be if the provision were in the Bill itself? If we could be assured of that and that the rules will be rigidly

applied, I would not press the Amendment.

Mr. Renton: The sanction in either case is the withdrawal of the certificate of approval, and to that extent both methods have the same effect.

Miss Bacon: In that case, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 15.—(TEMPORARY REMOVAL FROM APPROVED SCHOOL.)

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 9, line 38, to leave out from "If" to "that" in line 41, and to insert:
on information on oath laid by or on behalf of the managers of an approved school it appears to a justice of the peace on whom jurisdiction is hereinafter conferred".
It might be convenient, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, if with this Amendment we also considered the following Amendments:
In page 10, line 6, at end insert:
(2) A justice shall have jurisdiction for the purposes of subsection (1) of this section if he is a justice for the county or borough in which the approved school first mentioned in that subsection is situated, and is not one of the managers of that school.
In line 10 leave out "a" and insert "any".
The three Amendments stand together.
These Amendments are designed to meet some of the points raised by the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) in the debate on Clause 15 in Standing Committee and also some of the suggestions which were made in the new Clause put forward by him and the hon. and learned Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman).
As the Bill is reported to the House, Clause 15 (1) enables an information to be laid before any justice of the peace with a view to the temporary removal of somebody from an approved school, and it can be laid "by the managers or one of the managers" of the school "or by any person authorised in that behalf by them or him". The right hon. Gentleman, I think not unnaturally, expressed the fear that one manager might set the machinery of the Clause in motion in defiance of the views of his colleagues. That could happen, although one would expect it to be a very rare case, but although it is a rare case,


we agree that it is something that should be avoided and should never be allowed to happen. The first Amendment would, therefore, provide for the information to be laid "by or on behalf of the managers". That would enable the managers as a whole to confer authority to lay an information on such persons and subject to such restrictions as they thought best.
The new Clause which was on the Notice Paper during the Standing Committee, and which interested us very much, would have required the information to be laid before a justice of the peace for the petty sessional division in which the school was situated and who was not a manager of the school. The right hon. Gentleman, again very naturally, did not want a conflict of duties to arise between a person's duty as a justice of the peace and his duty as a manager of the school if he served in both capacities. We agree that that is a situation to be avoided.
A limitation related to the petty sessions area in which the school is situated seems to us to be unduly restrictive. Section 1 of the Magistrates' Courts Act, 1952, which enables a summons or warrant for an offence to be issued by a justice of the peace for the county or borough in which the offence was committed, seems to us to be a better precedent to follow. The second Amendment therefore confines the jurisdiction to issue a warrant, under subsection (1) of Clause 15 for the removal of a person from an approved school, to a justice of the peace in the county or borough in which the school is situated, such justice of the peace not being himself a manager of the school. I hope, therefore, that the hon. and learned Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North will feel that his principal points of criticism of the Clause have been met.
The third Amendment is a minor one which is consequential on the other two. I will explain the matter further if any hon. Members should so require, because this is a new procedure and it is important that we should get it right and understand it.

8.30 p.m.

Mr. Ede: The hon. and learned Gentleman the Joint Under-Secretary of

State might have apologised for the form in which this Clause was originally put before us, because it was a fantastic Clause and the criticisms I made of it in Committee were very mild compared with my feelings. I could not imagine that anyone who had attended three sittings at a magistrates' court, either as a magistrate or as counsel appearing before the court, could ever have contemplated the machinery that was set out, because it was open to abuses of every kind. I want to thank the hon. and learned Gentleman, however, because, although he has shown no signs of repentance, he has at any rate, brought
… forth fruits meet for repentance
and I accept that as some acknowledgement of the apology that he should have tendered to the House.
The Amendments do everything that I wanted to do and in fewer words than I employed. My experience of Acts of Parliament about these matters is that the fewer words there are the easier it is to ensure compliance with the requirements of the law in the procedures both at managers' meetings and in magistrates' courts. These three Amendments provide a workable scheme which, if carried out, by the chairman and clerk of the managers of an approved school and the chairman and clerk of any magistrates' court that may be involved, ought to avoid any abuse occurring of the kind, which, quite frankly, I very much feared.
In considering the question of a petty sessional division for the county or borough in which the school is situated, we must remember that we are leaving the matter wide in a large rural county. For instance, take the West Riding of Yorkshire. One may be on the hills out by Sedbergh and Ripon, and then go to one of the towns or villages near Selby and still be within the West Riding. I thought that my suggestion for a petty sessional division was worth bearing in mind, although I am aware that in certain Acts of Parliament the term "county' is used for a matter of this kind.
This is quite a minor matter, because I do not think that anybody, if they are somewhere in the south of the West Riding, will wander up to have a look at Penygent and Ingleborough and the rest of the mountains in order to get a


summons under this Clause, but I would still have preferred a petty sessional division. I believe, however, that the Clause as now drafted is workable, and if the people who have to work it will pay attention to its wording the abuses that I feared and detailed in Committee ought to be avoided.

Mr. Weitzman: This is a very important matter. It has now been put right, and we ought to put on record our appreciation of the vigilance of my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) to whom the credit for putting this matter right is due.

Miss Bacon: The Clause is very much better than it was. That is not saying a great deal, because it could not have been much worse than it was.
In a speech which showed an amazing knowledge of Yorkshire, my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) said that we now had a scheme which was workable and that the procedure could work. I grant that that is true, but I want to make my position and that of many of my hon. Friends quite clear. Although we believe that this is a workable scheme, we still do not like the principle embodied in the Clause—removing boys from approved school—although we admit that the procedure is much better than it was.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. V. Yates: I beg to move, in page 10, line 4, to leave out "or remand home".
This Clause is a drastic provision. It says that if it is necessary
for maintaining the discipline or proper functioning of the school that any person not less than fifteen years of age who is detained in school should forthwith be removed there-from pending inquiry as to the best means of dealing with him, the justice may issue a warrant directing him to be removed by a constable from the school to another approved school or to a remand centre or remand home, and there detained for a period of twenty-eight days unless sooner dealt with according to the law.
This drastic provision is opposed by many penal reformers.
I do not like the Clause, as I said in Committee, and I have moved the Amendment to remove one objectionable feature—the power which the Clause provides to remove a difficult or tough boy from an approved school and to

send him not merely to a remand centre, but possibly to a remand home. Remand homes were never intended to house young persons of 15 found to be too difficult for an approved school. The principal purpose of a remand home is to study persons from the age of eight onwards and to issue a report about them.
I visited a remand home in Birmingham and found that the superintendent was as horrified as his fellow superintendents at the suggestion contained in the Clause. I am sure that the Under-Secretary, like all other hon. Members, will have received a letter setting out the objection which the National Association of Remand Home Superintendents and Matrons has to the Clause. The remand home in Birmingham is run extraordinarily well and it is doing a very good job in extremely difficult circumstances. Its superintendent is the Honorary Secretary of the National Association of Remand Home Superintendents and Matrons. For a long time it has been impossible for this remand home to cater for the many demands made on it.
The Association's letter says:
The provision seems to us to have been inserted without any thought having been given to the real nature and function of a remand home and to the physical limitations of such an establishment to cope with the particular young man the authorities have in mind, and certain it is that the very valuable observation and assessment work performed and being developed today in our remand homes would be rendered immediately impossible were we to have imposed upon us this additional and exceptionally arduous new-task.
It is a pity that we did not have that information when we were discussing the Clause in Committee upstairs. We could then have examined it carefully.
The letter says:
Remand homes just haven't the necessary facilities to deal with such a problem even if one were to view it from a security point of view alone (security must obviously be a prime consideration) and, apart from this and other considerations isn't it too much to expect that remand home staffs, small as most of them are, can succeed with this exceptionally difficult and obstreperous young man when long experienced, well-trained adequate approved schools' staffs have already failed? Our experience in dealing with such boys in the past has been such that almost overnight they have tended to destroy or to pollute the tone and atmosphere of our homes despite maximum efforts by superintendents and staffs to win them


around, and we have to frankly state that it is just ' wishful thinking to believe that a change of environment like that proposed can effect a change of heart and attitude.
I want especially to emphasise these words:
… remand homes cater for children as young as ten, nine, and even eight years of age and many of those we receive into our homes are in fact non-delinquent. Isn't it terribly wrong that these same children should find themselves under the self-same remand home roof as those exceptionally difficult, tough, undisciplined and much older young men whom the approved schools just cannot manage? If this Clause becomes law we earnestly believe that despite our greatest effort's to avoid the situation remand homes would soon become little less than junior versions of prisons and the fine efforts by you and your colleagues in the House these days to avoid contamination of young offenders by incorrigible criminals would be offset by the harm done to young people in the remand homes.
That is the case for the Amendment. I appeal to the hon. and learned Gentleman. I am afraid that I have an inferiority complex when I ask him to accept one of my Amendments. I do do not know why he should look at me so suspiciously, and I wonder why I cannot win his heart on some of these matters. I appeal to him tonight. The Amendment will not alter the Clause. It will enable the difficult and tough persons to be dealt with, even though I dislike the Clause. The remand homes are doing exceptionally good and valuable work, which I hope will not be damaged in any way by their having to shoulder this additional responsibility.

8.45 p.m.

Mr. Renton: I am very glad that the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. V. Yates) has moved the Amendment. I realise that there have been anxieties about our intention, purely as a temporary measure, to allow remand homes to be used on occasion, and when necessary, to accommodate difficult boysand girls—and there will always be difficult boys and girls—from approved schools.
I think that I can allay those anxieties. I would point out three factors. First, this is a temporary measure. Secondly, a boy or girl who has been difficult in an approved school is not necessarily going to be difficult when removed from that school. The mere act of removal will often provide a salutary lesson to the child. Also, as was found at Carlton,

trouble in an approved school is caused not by a single boy but by a number of boys collectively getting into trouble as a gang in the school. As soon as the gang is broken up, either by removing the leader or by separating the members—providing it is done quickly, hence this emergency procedure—a salutary lesson is provided for each member of the gang. It must not be assumed in every case that because a boy has been difficult in the approved school from which he is removed he will necessarily be difficult in another approved school or remand home, at which he would stay for twenty-eight days, under the Clause.
Thirdly, under subsection (3) an interim order cannot be made until there is an intimation that arrangements have been made—in practice, by the Home Office—for the reception of that person in any other such institution, which includes a remand home. In other words, when an attempt is made by the Home Office to find a place for one of these unruly people in a certain remand home, the managers of that home may say, "We are sorry, but we are full up", in which case it would be an end of the matter, or, "We have room, but we have no detention room. We have no kind of closed unit, or any security arrangements. Is this a case in which security will be required?" If it has been reported to us that security is required, that remand home will not be used for that purpose.
In other words, the subsection acts as a safeguard and provides an assurance that the people in charge of remand homes who do not want these unruly young people to upset them will have the chance to make representations to the Home Office and to discuss the case before there is any question of allocation upon the making of an interim order.
Bearing these factors in mind, it is not unreasonable that we should ask that the remand homes in this country—there are fifty-one of them—should make their contribution—it will not be a very large one—to the solution of what is a very real practical difficulty which we have the duty to try to overcome, and which with the help of hon. Members opposite by their helpful Amendments we are trying to overcome by means of the new procedure in this Clause.
I do not think that I can put my case more clearly or more forcefully than that, but I ask the hon. Member for Lady wood, for whose interest, understanding and opinions I have always had respect, even if I do not always agree with them, and in spite of what he said about my reaction to his actions, to bear these thoughts in mind. I ask him whether we cannot carry him with us in asking that the remand homes of this country should make their modest contribution to the solution of this very considerable practical difficulty.

Miss Bacon: I should like to support my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. V. Yates) on this Amendment, because I feel particularly strongly about the matter. I do not like the whole of the Clause, but, nevertheless, to think that we can put young people into remand homes just like that, even though the Joint Under-Secretary says there are fifty-one of them, is to disregard the present position with regard to remand homes. I do not want to go over what my hon. Friend has said about the letter that we received today from those who are at work in remand homes.
The point is that there are no places available in many parts of the country in remand homes. In the People last Sunday, in the commentary, there was a paragraph entitled "Comes the truth", which I think was very unfair to the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of State at the Home Office, because it stated:
About live weeks ago, Mr. Dennis Vosper, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Home Office, told the House of Commons that there were enough remand homes to serve every area in Britain.
But at that very moment a young Huddersfield girl was being remanded in custody for one month, and, after spending six hours telephoning all over the country, the only place that could be found for her was in a remand home at Plymouth—400 miles away.
Two police officers then took the girl to Plymouth. They were away from their proper duties for three days. The girl escaped almost at once.
Caught and brought back to Huddersfield, she has now been remanded again—but because there is no official home for her, she has been remanded to her own home.

Total cost of the operation has been £100.

So much for Mr. Dennis Vosper's assurances."

The only thing that is wrong with that paragraph is that it was not the Minister of State who was telling us that there were sufficient remand homes. It was indeed the hon. and learned Gentleman the Joint Under-Secretary, who told us that during the Committee stage.

There are not the places in the remand homes, and the reply which the hon. and learned Gentleman gave to my hon. Friend about telephoning round to see if there was a place fills me with horror. This young person could not be placed in a remand home, and, according to this Clause, she has to go to some local police station. The police say that she was remanded from an approved school because she was a nuisance, and she was kept for forty-eight hours in the police station. We are now told by the hon. and learned Gentleman that they will be telephoning all round the country, apparently, to see if there is a remand home place, and if there is not, presumably, the boy or girl will stay in the police station. This will be completely unworkable with the present remand home position.

There is a second point raised by my hon. Friend which is even more important. I would say that nearly all the remand homes in the country are less able to deal with the difficult boy or girl than the approved school from which that boy or girl has come. It is preposterous to think of sending these difficult people into remand homes for twenty-eight days. Remand homes are not equipped with the staff, and, as my hon. Friend has said, very young children are there, some of whom have committed no offence whatsoever, and yet we are to have difficult girls and boys of 15 or 16 being placed in remand homes. I think that this will be completely unworkable, and I therefore support my hon. Friend in his Amendment.

Question put, That "or remand home" stand part of the Bill:—

The House divided: Ayes 186, Noes 104.

Division No. 134.]
AYES
[8.56 p.m.


Agnew, Sir Peter
Ashton, Sir Hubert
Barlow, Sir John


Allason, James
Balniel, Lord
Batsford, Brian


Arbuthnot, John
Barber, Anthony
Bell, Ronald




Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Hastings, Stephen
Prior, J. M. L.


Bevins, Rt. Hon. Reginald (Toxteth)
Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel
Prior-Palmer, Brig, Sir Otho


Bidgood, John C.
Henderson, John (Cathcart)
Proudfoot, Wilfred


Bishop, F. P.
Hiley, Joseph
Pym, Francis


Black, Sir Cyril
Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)
Rawlinson, Peter


Bossom, Clive
Hirst, Geoffrey
Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin


Bourne-Arton, A
Hobson, John
Rees, Hugh


Box, Donald
Hocking, Philip N.
Renton, David


Boyle, Sir Edward
Holland, Philip
Roberts, Sir Peter (Heeley)


Brewis, John
Hollingworth, John
Roots, William


Browne, Percy (Torrington)
Hopkins, Alan
Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard


Bryan, Paul
Hornsby-Smith, Rt. Hon. Patricia
Russell, Ronald


Buck, Antony
Hughes-Young, Michael
Scott-Hopkins, James


Bullard, Denys
Hurd, Sir Anthony
Shaw, M.


Butler, Rt. Hn. R. A. (Saffron Walden)
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Shepherd, William


Campbell, Gordon (Moray &amp;amp; Nairn)
Iremonger, T. L.
Skeet, T. H. H.


Cary, Sir Robert
Jackson, John
Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'rd &amp;amp; Chiswick)


Channon, H. P. G.
James, David
Spearman, Sir Alexander


Chlchester-Clark, R.
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)
Speir, Rupert


Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Stevens, Geoffrey


Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Cleaver, Leonard
Kerans, Cdr. J. S.
Stodart, J. A.


Cooke, Robert
Kirk, Peter
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm


Cooper, A. E.
Leburn, Gilmour
Storey, Sir Samuel


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry
Studholme, Sir Henry


Cordle, John
Lindsay, Martin
Sumner, Donald (Orpington)


Corfield, F. V.
Litchfield, Capt. John
Talbot, John E.


Costain, A. P.
Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Tapsell, Peter


Coulson, J. M.
MacArthur, Ian
Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)


Craddock, Sir Beresford
McLaren, Martin
Teeling, William


Critchley, Julian
Maclean, SirFitzroy (Bute&amp;amp;N. Ayrs.)
Temple, John M.


Crowder, F. P.
McMaster, Stanley R.
Thomas, Peter (Conway)


Curran, Charles
Maginnis, John E.
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin


Currie, G. B. H.
Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R.
Turner, Colin


Dalkeith, Earl of
Markham, Major Sir Frank
Turton, Rt. Hon. R. H.


Deedes, W. F.
Marten, Neil
van Straubenzee, W. R.


de Ferranti, Basil
Mathew, Robert (Honiton)
Vane, W. M. F.


Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.
Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)
Vaughan-Morgan, Sir John


Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Mawby, Ray
Vickers, Miss Joan


Elliott, R. W. (Nwcstle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis


Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn
Maydon, Lt. Cmdr. S. L. C.
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Errington, Sir Eric
Mills, Stratton
Walder, David


Farr, John
Montgomery, Fergus
Walker, Peter


Finlay, Graeme
Moore, Sir Thomas (Ayr)
Ward, Dame Irene


Fisher, Nigel
More, Jasper (Ludlow)
Webster, David


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Nabarro, Gerald
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)
Neave, Airey
Whitelaw, William


Gammans, Lady
Nicholson, Sir Godfrey
Williams, Dudley (Exeter)


Gibson-Watt, David
Noble, Michael
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Glover, Sir Douglas
Osborn, John (Hallam)
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Glyn, Sir Richard (Dorset, N.)
Osborne, Cyril (Louth)
Wise, A. R.


Goodhart, Philip
Page, John (Harrow, west)
Woodhouse, C. M.


Goodhew, Victor
Page, Graham (Crosby)
Woodnutt, Mark


Grant-Ferris, Wg Cdr. R.
Partridge, E.
Woollam, John


Green, Alan
Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth
Worsley, Marcus


Gresham Cooke, R.
Pike, Miss Mervyn
Yates, William (The Wrekin)


Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.
Pilkington, Sir Richard



Gurden, Harold
Pitt, Miss Edith
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)
Pott, Percivall
Mr. Peel and Mr. Frank Pearson.


Harrison, Brian (Maldon)
Price, David (Eastleigh)



Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)






NOES


Ainsley, William
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Houghton, Douglas


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Evans, Albert
Hoy, James H.


Awbery, Stan
Fitch, Alan
Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)


Bacon, Miss Alice
Fletcher, Eric
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)


Benson, Sir George
Foot, Dingle (Ipswich)
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)


Blackburn, F.
Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
Hunter, A. E.


Boyden, James
Forman, J. C.
Hynd, H. (Accrington)


Brockway, A. Fenner
Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Hynd, John (Attercliffe)


Cliffe, Michael
George, LadyMeganLloyd(Crmrthn)
Jenkins, Roy (Stechford)


Collick, Percy
Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. G.
Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Gourlay, Harry
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)


Crosland, Anthony,
Grey, Charles
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)


Crossman, R. H. S.
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.


Cullen, Mrs. Alice
Grimond, J.
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)


Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Come Valley)
Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Hart, Mrs. Judith
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson


Deer, George
Hayman, F. H.
MacColl, James


Dempsey, James
Herbison, Miss Margaret
McInnes, James


Diamond, John
Hill, J. (Midlothian)
Mallatieu, E. L. (Brigg)


Ede, Rt. Hon. C.
Holman, Percy
Manuel, A. C.


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
Holt, Arthur
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.







Millan, Bruce
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Weitzman, David


Mitchison, G. R.
Ross, William
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


Mulley, Frederick
Short, Edward
White, Mrs. Eirene


Neal, Harold
Slater, Mrs. Harriet (Stoke, N.)
Wilkins, W. A.


Oram, A. E.
Slater, Joseph (Sedgefield)
Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)


Oswald, Thomas
Small, William
Willis, E. G. (Edinburgh, E.)


Owen, will
Sorensen, R. W.
Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)


Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)
Spriggs, Leslie
Winter-bottom, R. E.


Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Steele, Thomas
Woof, Robert


Pentland, Norman
Stones, William
Yates, Victor (Ladywood)


Popplewell, Ernest
Swingler, Stephen
Zilliacus, K.


Proctor, W. T.
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)



Randall, Harry
Wade, Donald
TELLERS FOR THE NOES


Rankin, John
Wainwright, Edwin
Mr. Lawson and


Reynolds, G. W.
Warbey, William
Mr. Charles A. Howell

Amendments made: In page 10, line 6, at end insert:
(2) A justice shall have jurisdiction for the purposes of subsection (1) of this section if he is a justice for the county or borough in which the approved school first mentioned in that subsection is situated, and is not one of the managers of that school.

In line 10, leave out "a" and insert "any".—[Mr. Renton.]

Clause 17.—(PROCEEDINGS FOR REMOVAL UNDER S. 16.)

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 12, line 26, to leave out "twenty-eight" and to insert "twenty-one".
This Amendment reduces from twenty-eight days to twenty-one days the period of interim detention of a young person brought before the court under Clause 16 with a view to transfer from approved school to borstal. The hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) asked me to consider this point and, on balance, we favour the shorter period, bearing in mind that under subsection (3) of the Clause the period of interim detention under subsection (2) can, if necessary, be extended.

Mr. MacColl: Thank you very much.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 18.—(DIRECTIONS TO MANAGEMENT OF APPROVED SCHOOLS.)

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 13, line 5, to leave out from beginning to first "any" in line 6 and to insert:
If it appears to the Secretary of State that the provision made in".
I suggest, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that this Amendment could be taken with that in page 13, line 9.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that that would be for the convenience of the House.

Mr. Renton: The effect of these two Amendments combined is to restrict the exercise of the power to give directions to managers of approved schools to cases where it appears to the Secretary of State that the provision made in the school with respect to the subject matter of the direction is inadequate or unsuitable, and not merely irrespective of the inadequacy or unsuitability of the provision made.
In his Second Reading speech my right hon. Friend said of the power he was taking:
I intend … as far as possible on persuasion, but I should like to have this power in reserve."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1961; Vol. 630, c. 572.]
The intention is to use the power only in exceptional cases where at an approved school the standard in one or more of the matters referred to in the Clause is clearly unsatisfactory. The County Councils Association has suggested to us that this intention should appear on the face of the Clause. We accept that suggestion, and this is our proposed way of doing it.
If the Amendments are made, the first subsection of the Clause will read as follows—and it might be helpful to hon. Members to follow the position made by the Amendments:
If it appears to the Secretary of State that the provision made in any approved school with regard to any matter relating to"—
and then it sets out the matters:
is inadequate or unsuitable, he may give to the managers such directions as he thinks necessary for securing that proper provision is made with respect thereto.

Mr. MacColl: In general, I am against this proposal because, in general, we think that the Bill is very weak on the whole subject of the administration of approved schools. As we said in Standing Committee, we feel that the Government have completely failed to grasp


the important questions about approved schools and to do something about them.
An Amendment by which we sought to extend the powers of the Secretary of State was defeated in the Committee. We had another shot, in the form of a new Clause, at an alternative way of dealing with some of the particular difficulties of the self-perpetuating voluntary approved school. That new Clause has not been called, and we have not therefore been able to develop our views on it. We are now faced with an Amendment the general effect of which is either, as the hon. and learned Gentleman rather suggested, that it does not mean anything at all, or that it limits the width of the Secretary of State's discretion.
We feel that the relationship between the Secretary of State and the approved schools is too tenuous. That has been demonstrated by some of the difficulties which have arisen in approved schools. We are anxious to see a much closer connection between the Secretary of State and the approved schools. We are therefore not in favour of anything which, in form at any rate, appears to restrict and narrow his discretion.
I can understand that the local authorities may be uneasy about this power. I should like to see local authorities given more power and a bigger place in the approved school system. However, that is something that we cannot discuss. We are very much limited in what we can discuss, but the fact that the hon. and learned Gentleman has tabled this Amendment gives me the opportunity to say what we feel about it. We regard the whole of this part of the Bill dealing with the management of approved schools as most inadequate.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. R. Gresham Cooke: I beg to move, in page 13, line 6, after "school" to insert:
other than an approved school provided wholly or partly by a local authority".
The object of the Amendment is to exclude from the ambit of the Clause approved schools provided by local authorities. I appreciate that my hon. and learned Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State has gone a long way to meet the representations made by local authorities on this matter. I acknowledge

that fully. I suggest, however, that these schools might be withdrawn altogether from Government control. It is a good Home Office principle, and certainly a good Conservative principle, to devolve power as far as possible to local authorities, but the Clause still leaves the Home Secretary with power to give directions to a local authority school, although, I admit, only in certain circumstances. It seems to me that there is no need to tie such local authority schools to the rules which apply to a school run by a voluntary organisation. The Home Secretary has power to withdraw a certificate of approval if he wishes. If he does, the Exchequer grant stops.
The relationship between the Government and local authorities was very well set out in the First Report of the Local Government Manpower Committee of 1950, Cmnd. 7870. It referred to the need to recognise that local authorities are responsible bodies and are competent to discharge their own functions, and that they exercise their responsibilities in their own right and not as agents of Government Departments. It is, therefore, unnecessary nowadays for the Home Office to control local authorities, even if mistakes are sometimes made. If they are, that is a matter for the local electorate. We should trust them and the local councillors.

Mr. Renton: I grant to my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Mr. Gresham Cooke) that it is unusual for a Minister to have power to give directions to local authorities on matters of administrative detail. However, approved schools, being part of the system of treatment of offenders for which the Home Office has a central responsibility to Parliament concerning England and Wales, are in a special position. Much of the general system of treatment of offenders is under the direct control of the Home Secretary through the Prison Commissioners—prisons, borstals and detention centres. But local authorities and voluntary bodies play a valuable part in the treatment of young offenders, especially through the approved school system. Where they do so it is surely essential in a matter of this kind that the Government should have in reserve the power to rectify weaknesses in the system wherever they occur, whether in local authority schools or others.
The power conferred by the Clause as amended by the Government, admittedly in a way that the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) does not like, will be restricted to circumstances in which a weakness has manifested itself. We consider that, unless it is accepted that approved schools run by local authorities are always certain to be run without fault, it would be wrong to differentiate between local authority schools and others by exempting the local authority ones from the operation of the Clause. That is why I could not advise the House to accept my hon. Friend's Amendment. I hope that, with that explanation, my hon. Friend may feel it in his heart not to press the Amendment.

9.15 p.m.

Miss Bacon: I have a good deal of sympathy with the Amendment. The Under-Secretary of State has just said that approved schools are in a special position and that it is wrong to differentiate between local authority and other schools. It is true that approved schools are in a special position, a position which many of us on this side of the House do not like. We should like to see great alterations.
The Under-Secretary seems to put all the approved schools together and he says that it is wrong to differentiate. This is not just a matter of detail of what happens in the schools. There arises the question of the whole control of the schools. A local authority approved school is run by that authority. Most of the managers are members of the local authority and are answerable to an electorate, whereas the voluntary approved schools are not in that position.
Most of the approved schools are not local authority schools, nor are they run by a voluntary organisation. Fifty-one of the 118 approved schools are run by self-appointed local committees. To say that they should be in exactly the same position as schools run by properly elected local authorities is ludicrous. As my hon. Friend the Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) has said, we should be out of order in pursuing the matter since our new Clause which would have opened the whole question of the control of approved schools has not been called.

We feel considerable sympathy, however, with the hon. Member for Twickenham (Mr. Gresham Cooke) in his Amendment.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: In view of what my hon. and learned Friend the Under-Secretary has said, although I am not completely satisfied in the matter, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment made: In page 13, line 9, at end insert:
is inadequate or unsuitable, he may give to the managers such directions as he thinks necessary for securing that proper provision is made with respect thereto".—[Mr. Renton.]

Clause 19.—(CONSTITUTION OF MANAGERS.)

Mr. Renters: I beg to move, in page 13, line 21, to leave out from "order" to the end of line 24 and to insert:
shall have effect notwithstanding anything in any trust deed relating to the school
I suggest, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that this Amendment might be taken with the next one.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that that would be convenient.

Mr. Renton: Subsection (1) of the Clause as reported to the House empowers the Secretary of State to include in an order regulating the constitution and proceedings of the managers of a voluntary approved school
such modifications of any trust deed relating to the school as appear to the Secretary of State to be necessary for removing any inconsistency between the provisions of the order and of that deed.
The first of the two Amendments takes away this power and provides instead what, I think, the House may agree is something better, namely, that the provisions of the order
shall have effect notwithstanding anything in any trust deed relating to the school".
The reason for this change is that alterations in the constitution of the managers of an approved school made by order under the Clause may have to be varied from time to time in the light of experience and it would be a cumbersome thing to have to make corresponding amendments in the trust deed on


each occasion that there is a fresh order. This Amendment would save all that trouble.
The second of the Amendments adds two new subsections to the Clause. The new subsection (4) provides that if a school ceases to be an approved school any order made under subsection (1) and any appointment of additional managers under subsection (3) shall cease to have effect. A school may cease to be an approved school either because the Secretary of State withdraws his certificate of approval or because the managers voluntarily surrender it. Both of these are very rare contingencies, but we must provide for them.
The new subsection (5) gives the term "trust deed" a wide definition similar to that which was given to it in the Education Act, 1944. Those hon. Members who discussed this matter of voluntary approved schools in some detail in the Standing Committee will remember that they are managed by a variety of bodies under a variety of legal instruments which may include not only a trust deed in the strict sense of the word but also a will or even articles of a registered company. Also there are some voluntary approved schools which operate under the rules of unincorporated associations and there are yet others which are operated under charitable schemes made by the High Court or by the Charity Commissioners or by the Minister of Education. It is necessary technically that we should include within our definition all these possible types of trust deed used by all these types of body.

Mr. MacColl: I find some difficulty in following the hon. and learned Gentlemen in his account of these changes and in assessing their precise significance. We considered this Clause in a fair amount of detail in Committee. I did not appreciate then that he was proposing to make alterations of this kind.
One of the points I am not very clear about is, although he mentioned the Education Act, how far these Amendments depart from the general procedure of the Education Act, how far they make a new departure for which there are not precedents in other fields.
The other point I want to ask about is in relation to the new subsection (4) which deals with schools ceasing to be

approved schools. Would the hon. and learned Gentleman explain whether it is completely free for the managers or trustees of a voluntary approved school just to go out of business whenever they want to? Is there any limit on their powers which they have to give notice that they are going out of business? Is there any provision whereby, if they decide they do not want to continue with the school, the Secretary of State gets first refusal in order to be able to make other arrangements for carrying on the institution?
In the new Clause which must not be discussed we made some suggestion for providing that where the managers want to give up running an approved school the local authority should have first refusal. It seems to me that it might put us in a very embarrassing position. We might find that public money had been used for many years in maintaining an approved school. The school might have built a substantial goodwill and an experienced team as a staff and might have filled an essential place in the working of the approved schools system. As a result of pressure applied by the Home Secretary on the managers to make changes in their administration they might say that they would not continue under those conditions. This was said in Standing Committee as being one of the dangers in an Amendment which we then moved. If that happened, would the staff, the goodwill and everything else disappear overnight, or is there some arrangements whereby the school would be preserved if it filled a key need in the approved schools system?

Mr. Ede: I wish to deal with the Amendment which the Joint Under-Secretary has moved, but most of what I shall say about it will also apply to the second Amendment which I understand we are discussing with it. This is a strange Amendment to come from a Conservative Government. This is even more powerful than the usual Henry VIII Clause. What the Secretary of State decides to do shall have effect notwithstanding anything in any trust deeds relating to the school. The wishes of the pious founder and all the other people, less pious, who have maintained the school will be subject to the right hon. Gentleman's view when he comes to


make an order regulating the constitution and the proceedings of the managers. I think it desirable that that should be so, but then I am not a Conservative.
These powers will have to be used with very great discretion unless there are to be even more than sixty-nine hon. Members opposite upset by some of the things that it will be possible to do. I see that the Home Secretary has returned to the Chamber. As we did not see him in Committee upstairs we might as well take this opportunity of letting him understand what we want.
The right hon. Gentleman wrote me a letter dated 7th April, which, thanks to the inefficiency of the Postmaster-General, did not reach me until yesterday morning, but the right hon. Gentleman has very much hampered me by putting at the top of the letter the word "personal" because that has prevented my discussing it with my hon. Friend the Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) and my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon). We wished that a voluntary school should have added to its management committee some persons nominated by the local authority in whose area it was situated and possibly also, where a school covers a wide area and accepts children from all over the country, representatives nominated by more than one local authority.
We proposed in Committee an Amendment to provide that at least one-third of the membership of the management committee would be composed of persons nominated by the local authority. Judging from his letter to me, the right hon. Gentleman appeared to think that we wanted members of a local authority appointed. That is not so. We were trying to follow what has been the practice with rate-aided and State-aided schools since 1902, and to allow the local authority to nominate one-third of the number, not necessarily from its own membership but from persons whom by the local authority's own knowledge of the locality, it believed to be suitable persons for this purpose.
9.30 p.m.
Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will allow me to quote his letter. I regard it as a very precious private possession at the moment, but if he is willing to give

it the circulation to which its authorship ought to entitle it, I will read it. It says:
I intend that we shall examine the constitution of each committee of management and that in the exercise of the powers under Clause 19 (1) we shall provide for the addition of one or more local authority members unless it is clear that the constitution of the committee already provides a sufficiently broad representation. I must reserve my judgment in exceptional cases, but I should expect the result to be that it will become the normal practice for local authority members to be on the committees of management.
If they are local authority representatives rather than local authority members, I welcome that as bringing the schools more into line with the general education system of the country, and I hope that the county councils and county borough councils, which are the authorities for this purpose, will take some pains in selecting suitable people.
I proposed for consideration by the Standing Committee—it stood on the Notice Paper for a long time—a scheme to constitute county councils and county borough councils approved school authorities similar to the way in which they are local education authorities, and enabling these voluntary approved schools to be part of the system of such an authority in the same way as the Church and Roman Catholic schools are part of the provision maintained by local education authorities in the counties and county boroughs.
But, in the end, I was faced with the difficulty that there are, comparatively speaking, so few of these schools that most local approved school authorities would have only one school to manage. It might be a local authority school or it might be a voluntary school. I do not think that we want to create the tremendous machinery that would have been involved merely for that purpose. However, I hope that the local authorities in whose areas the schools are situated will be given opportunities to assist them with regard to some of the problems of management, particularly where they get into difficulties with the local authorities or even with benches of magistrates and the parents of pupils, which might lead to recourse to the courts if they do not get the kind of advice that a local authority legal department can give to the existing schools under local education authorities.
As I say, I do not mind the right hon. Gentleman and his successors as Secretary of State having the tremendous powers which the first Amendment gives them with regard to trust deeds. The way in which some of these need to be amended cries out for this drastic form of treatment, and I hope that, as a result of the powers which the right hon. Gentleman is taking under these Amendments, we shall be able to get rid of some of the difficulties and anomalies which were alluded to by my hon. Friends in the Standing Committee.

Mr. R. A. Butler: The right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) has kindly acknowledged my letter. I am sorry that it was of such a personal character, but it was written from home and I dare say that it was marked "personal" as a natural instinct. Perhaps I should have made it available to his hon. Friends, but he has read out the vital paragraph, which I did not intend to keep private. I was intending to say something about this matter, and I will do so now. The position is as stated in my letter, but I shall enlarge upon it.
I accept that instead of "local authority members" it should be "local authority representatives". I think that the expression "local authority members" is wrong. He spoke to me about this some time ago, and we were considering the matter in relation to our old experience as joint partners in the Education Act, 1944. I must make it clear that at one stage I thought that we could have a reform of the approved schools more on the lines of the Education Act, but I then found that that was not practicable, in view of the nature of approved schools, and that is the answer to the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South East (Miss Bacon), who put down a thoughtful Clause which was not called, dealing with the provision and management of approved schools.
I do not think that we could have done anything quite so neat and tidy as she proposed in relation to the approved schools, which do not follow a local authority area. The situation is different from that of the Education Act, under which schools are essentially under the local authorities. We have found under Clauses 18 and 19 as amended, and in this machinery, a method of close association

with the Home Office while still preserving the voluntary principle.
While the voluntary principle has been criticised in the House, and while the self-perpetuating nature of many of these bodies has been criticised, I think that, with our new powers and the building programme that we have in mind, we shall be able to modify any evil results of the present organisation of the schools and be able to enhance the value of the voluntary principle.
Only a proportion of these schools is voluntary. The others are under local authorities. There are quite sufficient powers now under the central authority to watch over voluntary schools and improve their position, but it may not be as broad a plan as was envisaged by Members opposite. I believe, however, that it will be effective, which is what matters.
I am sure that the House will join with me in wishing the voluntary and local authority schools the best of good fortune in this new venture which they will be undertaking, and in thanking those who have given so much voluntary work in the past for all that they have done and intend to do.

Miss Bacon: I am sorry that I was not in my place when this discussion began, and I did not quite get the gist of the letter which had been sent by the Home Secretary to my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede). But while it seems that the position is to be better than it has been up to now, I hope that the Home Secretary will not regard this as an end.
I hope that, when he is considering the further Bill dealing with children and young persons, which he has promised us, he will once again look at the approved school system and see whether he could not do something on the lines which we would have liked. The Amendment which we had on the Order Paper was drawn up with the training colleges throughout the country in mind. Under that system, we have one training college for several local authorities. We thought that that plan was reasonable.
It is not only a matter of the numbers of people who will be representing the local authorities on the boards of managers; it is the services of the local authorities that are so important. Where we have a local authority school—and


only a quarter of the approved schools are local authority schools—there is close integration with the medical and educational services of the local authority concerned, which we do not get with the voluntary or local committee schools.
The word "voluntary" in this respect is rather misleading, because it does not mean "voluntary" in the sense of a voluntary school under the education system. Of the 118 approved schools in the country, 51 do not belong to any voluntary organisation but are simply local committee schools some of which have been carried on in that way since the middle of the nineteenth century. They are responsible to nobody in their area except themselves, and when a manager dies or retires the other managers simply co-opt someone in the same area in his place. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will not regard this as the end, but will look at the whole matter again. At the same time, we thank him for going some of the way towards meeting us on this matter.

Mr. A. P. Costain: As a trustee of one of these charitable organisations running some of these approved schools, I should like to ask my right hon. Friend to clarify one small point. What is the relative position between the Charity Commission and the trustees when the Home Secretary uses these powers? This is an unusual power which he has taken upon himself. Will there be any difficulty about getting court approval for the Charity Commissioners?

Mr. Butler: This is complicated, because it involves the new Charities Act, 1960. If my hon. Friend puts down a Question, I will answer it. In any case, I will communicate with him and give him a full answer.

Mr. MacColl: Will the hon. and learned Gentleman answer the important question which I put about schools which give up business?

Mr. Renton: The hon. Member asked three questions. The answer to the first is that the definition in subsection (5) in the Amendment in page 13, line 43 follows in substance, if not in precise terms the definition of "trust deed" in the Education Act, 1944.
The hon. Member's second question was what notice had to be given by the managers of a voluntary approved school before it could be closed. The answer is that they have to give six months' notice to my right hon. Friend.
His third question was about the assets, the property of an approved school, most of which will have been paid for entirely out of public funds. That is governed by Section 104 of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933. The hon. Member will find that under that provision various arrangements can be made as a condition of the payment of capital contributions towards expenditure by the managers on capital account. When a school is closed, the managers repay the whole or part of the capital sum to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary; or, if he wishes, my right hon. Friend can arrange for the school which has been closed to be taken over by a local authority, as another approved school run by a local authority; or can find other managers to run it on a voluntary basis as before; or, if it were to be taken over for some other public purpose, there would have to be a financial adjustment between the Government and the managers—in other words, the Government would buy the school from the managers. There would be no question of public money which had been advanced on capital account having been thrown away.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made: In page 13, line 43, at end insert:
or under subsection (4) of this section.
(4) Any order or appointment made under this section in respect of an approved school shall cease to have effect in the event of that school ceasing to be an approved school; but nothing in this subsection shall affect the validity of anything done while the order or appointment was in force.
(5) In this section 'trust deed', in relation to any school, includes any instrument (not being an order under this section) regulating the constitution of the school or its maintenance, management or conduct or the constitution or proceedings of its managers".—[Mr. Renton.]

Clause 22.—(MISCELLANEOUS AMENDMENTS OF PRISON ACT, 1952.)

Amendment made: In page 14, line 35, leave out subsection (1).—[Mr. Renton.]

9.45 p.m.

Mr. V. Yates: I beg to move, in page 15, line 22, after "next", to insert "but one".
Subsection (4) says:
A prisoner who would, apart from this subsection, be discharged on any of the days to which this subsection applies in his case shall be discharged on the next preceding day which is not one of those days.
The days referred to are Christmas Day, Good Friday, and Bank Holidays. I am asking that instead of being released one day before a Bank Holiday or Christmas Day, he should be released two days, or 48 hours, before it.
I will make another attempt to convince the hon. and learned Gentleman of the reasonableness of the Amendment. I did not table an Amendment in Committee upstairs, but I asked a question on this subject in the hope that this proposal would be acceptable. I called his attention to examples of prisoners who had been discharged from Dartmoor on Christmas Eve and who had arrived in Birmingham at 5 o'clock in the afternoon of that day. What opportunities have probation officers to get those prisoners settled in on Christmas Eve? I am thinking particularly of homeless prisoners. I know that not many prisoners are involved, but experienced probation officers tell me that this is a problem. I merely ask that where a prisoner is due to be released on Christmas Day or on a Bank Holiday, instead of being released the day before he should be released two days before.

Mr. Hobson: As I read it, the hon. Gentleman is proposing that nobody should be released on a Friday, because anybody serving a sentence of more than a month is excluded from release on a Saturday, and the Amendment surely would prevent a prisoner being released on the Friday before that Saturday?

Mr. Yates: I am proposing a difference of one day, irrespective of the sentence. I am thinking particularly of those who have to travel long distances. If a Prisoner was due to be released from a prison in the south of England on a Bank Holiday and had to travel to Dunham, he might arrive there on the eve of the Bank Holiday. The hon. and learned Gentleman said that administrative arrangements were being made in certain cases to deal with this problem. I do not consider that the Amendment would interfere with any special arrangements which might be made. I am

merely asking that a more generous attiture should be adopted when a prisoner is released because it is most important that he should be rehabilitated, and I do not believe that we have anything like the proper method for rehabilitating released prisoners.
The hon. and learned Member said that he would consider the matter and write to me. He did so, saying:
I do not think it would be reasonable to provide that all prisoners should be released two days before a bank holiday period, as opposed to the one day for which we have provided in the Bill, since the number of prisoners faced with a long journey on discharge is but a small proportion of the total number released. I have therefore considered whether it would be practicable to make special provision for the small class of prisoners in respect of whom difficulty may be expected to arise. I am sorry to say that I have been forced to the conclusion that it would not be practicable to legislate specially for them since they are not a homogeneous or distinguishable group.
That sounds very much like Civil Service jargon. In fact, the only difference is that the hon. and learned Gentleman does not end by saying, "I am your obedient servant". As far as I know, he never has been. He goes on to say:
I have therefore reviewed the existing arrangements to satisfy myself that everything possible is done to help the man who on his discharge is going to have a fairly long journey to his destination. I find that there are already special arrangements for prisoners discharged at weekends and before public holidays, and for those who have an unusually long journey home and cannot reach the local National Assistance Board office before it closes on that day.
Really! I should have thought that, whatever arrangements he wants to make, nothing that I am suggesting would prevent his adopting them in special cases, if he has the power to do so.
He continues by referring to the fact that the National Assistance Board makes a payment to the discharged man
sufficient to enable him to maintain himself until he can apply for a full allowance at the local office at his destination.
I asked a probation officer with much experience what he thought about this, and he said:
It is true that it is the homeless type we have in mind but it is extremely difficult to find lodgings for a prisoner whom the aftercare officer has probably never seen …


He may not have seen the prisoner until he is suddenly confronted with him just before a bank holiday.
We appreciate it is difficult to legislate for such a small group but we would have thought it best to err on the side of generosity and allow 48 hours to settle a man in accommodation before a bank holiday. It is possible, and I am sure you will agree with this, that it is false economy to risk a man's future rehabilitation, with the subsequent loss to society, for the sake of the extra 24 hours.
The probation officer ends by saying:
… in theory the present arrangements are adequate, but in practice are frequently found wanting!
That letter is from a man of very great experience. Whatever the hon. and learned Gentleman may say, the present position is not satisfactory. We are treating these men in a mean and niggardly fashion, whereas we should make sure that there is adequate time for them to be properly rehabilitated.
I have no more confidence in moving this Amendment than I had in moving the previous one. When the hon. and learned Member accepts one of my Amendments it will be a cause for great rejoicing and celebration. Nevertheless, I hope that he can accept this one. In the end he might find himself able to move away from the usual official jargon of the answers that we often get in these matters, and get down to something a little more human.

Mr. Renton: I live in the hope that I may one day be able to accept one of the hon. Gentleman's Amendments, but I do not wish to encourage him to go on trying too often. On this occasion, I am afraid that the Amendment which he has put down will probably have results which he himself did not expect. He is asking that we should go much further than he asked in Committee. During the Committee stage, he suggested that there should be no discharge within forty-eight hours before a Bank Holiday. Now, he is asking for no discharge for forty-eight hours before a Saturday, and that limits the opportunities of discharge very considerably, especially if there is a Bank Holiday anywhere near.
For example, in a year in which Christmas Day fell on a Tuesday, it would require a prisoner to be discharged on the preceding Friday. On the other hand, a prisoner due for discharge on Boxing Day in the same year—that is to

say, on Wednesday—would be discharged on Monday, and that would be Christmas Eve, which would be precisely what I think the hon. Gentleman is trying to avoid. A similar situation would arise in respect of prisoners due for discharge on Saturday, 28th December, because the Wednesday and Thursday would be Christmas Day and Boxing Day, and the prisoner would again find himself discharged on Christmas Eve.
I know that the hon. Gentleman is concerned, as we all are, about the prisoner who has to make a long journey on the day of discharge, but these cases are fortunately few in number, and it would be unreasonable to grant the sweeping concession sought on their behalf if it would have the strange results which I have mentioned, more especially as special arrangements are made to mitigate hardship by special payments at the prison itself.
For these reasons, although this is not an easy matter and I agree with the hon. Gentleman that we are all trying to do our best to avoid any kind of inhumanity in this matter, I feel obliged to advise the House that the hon. Gentleman's Amendment should not on this occasion be accepted.

Amendment negatived.

Clause 23.—(MANAGEMENT OF PRISONS, ETC.)

Miss Bacon: I beg to move, in page 15, line 32, to leave out Clause 23.
This is a very important Amendment, taken at a late hour, and if I speak for only a short time, it is not because I do not consider this to be one of the most important things in the Bill. Clause 23 seeks to transfer the whole of the Prison Commission to within the Home Office. On Second Reading, the Home Secretary said very little about this, but we had a long discussion during the Committee stage, when grave doubts were expressed from both sides of the Committee.
The trouble is that nobody really knows what this will mean. We are told, on the one hand, that it can mean something considerable; on the other hand, we are told that it does not really mean anything at all. Indeed, some


people say that it does not mean anything, that it does not make any difference, that it is just administration and so on. If it means nothing at all, I think it is very unwise of the right hon. Gentleman to include it in the Bill. On the other hand, if it does mean something, and if it means great changes in the set-up in regard to the administration of prisons, we should like to know what these far-reaching changes are.
There have been other attempts in the past to transfer the whole of the functions of the Prison Commission to the Home Office. I think that this is the third attempt. It seems to me that some official, I suspect, in the Home Office has persuaded the Home Secretary that this is a very good thing to do. The last attempt was in 1948, when my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) sought to include this in the Criminal Justice Bill then. On that occasion my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Sir G. Benson) was successful in persuading my right hon. Friend to take this provision out of the Bill. At that time, rather curiously—

It being Ten o'clock, further consideration of the Bill, as amended, stood adjourned.

Proceedings on the Criminal Justice Bill exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[Mr. R. A. Butler.]

Bill, as amended (in the Standing Committee), further considered.

Miss Bacon: On that occasion my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield was supported, rather strangely, by the hon. and learned Gentleman now the Joint Under-Secretary to the Home Department and also by the hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore). I am pleased to say that the hon. Member for Ayr was quite consistent and voted against his Government on this matter during Committee stage.
The Prison Commissioners are now responsible to the Home Secretary. They are not an independent body but, over the years the Commission has built up a reputation and a certain confidence in the minds of the people. People think of the Prison Commission as something rather separate from the Home Office

even though it is responsible to the Home Secretary. It has built up a reputation for being progressive. Although the Commissioners are not independent, they are thought to have a certain independence. We know the members of the Prison Commission by name. They address meetings and conferences in this country. Public opinion has expressed itself very forcibly on this matter in some organs of the Press. In Committee I quoted some of those opinions. I should like to refer to the Observer for 6th November, 1960, which said:
… the possibility of the Home Secretary having power to dissolve the Prison Commission ought to be vigorously resisted.
The Observer of 20th November, 1960, said:
Mr. Butler would like the Prison Commission to become 'part of a wider organisation, covering all Home Office responsibilities for criminal justice and the treatment of offenders'. If this means that the Commismission is to be swallowed up in the Home Office, Parliament would do well to consider what would be lost, as well as gained by the change.
This week there were leading articles on the subject in three newspapers. The Guardian said, on 11th April:
And what about a new and separate Probation Commission?
It also said:
Mr. Butler should take account of the stiff opposition to his proposal to abolish the Prison Commission and make it a department of the Home Office. On committee stage, the proposal was only retained by one vote.
I am not sure that that is quite correct. On 11th April, The Times said:
It is to be hoped, for example, that the threat to abolish the Prison Commission will be reconsidered. The arguments in favour of such a step turn out to rest more heavily on administrative convenience than on constitutional consistency and they are plausible enough, but there is a real danger here, as elsewhere, in the field of penology, of penny wisdom.
In addition, the Daily Herald said today:
In the interests of administrative 'streamlining' it proposes to turn the Prison Commission into a mere department of the Home Office. That would be a bureaucratic crime. The Commission is much more than just another department of faceless Civil Servants. Its near independence has allowed the Commission to try experiments in penal reform that no Whitehall department would ever risk.
I quote these articles at some length because they show that there is great opposition to this proposal in sections of the Press.
We found during the Committee stage that there has been no difficulty whatsoever in obtaining information about anything for which the Prison Commission is responsible. It issues a full annual report. In addition, it publishes a very useful booklet entitled "Prisons and Borstals". There is no lack of information on which we can argue our case about anything which is administered by the Prison Commission. I contrast that with the lack of information, which was evident during the whole Committee stage, from the Children's Department of the Home Office.
We fear very much that, if the Prison Commission and the Commissioners are swallowed up within the Home Office, they will become anonymous. We fear that they will not be so approachable and that we shall not have reports, as we have had in the past. I hope that the Home Secretary will have second thoughts tonight. If he does not have second thoughts, I hope that he will at any rate justify this in a manner in which it has not been justified up to now by any Government spokesman. I know that there is strong feeling about this on both sides of the House, and I therefore hope that we shall be able to persuade the right hon. Gentleman to change his mind.

Miss Joan Vickers: In Committee I found myself in the unsual position of voting with my hon. Friend the Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore). I hope that does not mean that I am any more wrong on this occasion than I consider that my hon. Friend is on other occasions.
I want to ask my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary some questions about his proposal to abolish the Prison Commission. Present and former prison governors fear that the abolition of the Prison Commission will seriously affect the efficiency and morale of the prison service itself. Prison and borstal work makes very heavy personal demands on members of the staff, and there is very little opportunity for them to discuss their problems. It is therefore particularly necessary to have senior officials who have a particular understanding and sympathy to deal with their difficulties.
My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said on Second Reading:

I should like to make clear that the present proposal in the Bill to take powers implies no reflection whatever on the work of the Prison Commission. Goodness knows, there has never been a more distinguished body.
My right hon. Friend went on to pay tribute to its Chairman, Sir Lionel Fox, and to the able young man who has now succeeded him. He continued:
The more one can say in praise of the work of the Prison Commission, the more apt that praise would be.
Further, when discussing the changes which have taken place since 1877, my right hon. Friend said:
In recent years, however, the headquarters staff of the Prison Commission has been strengthened to enable it to play a greater part in the development of policy…
I consider that the Commission should be retained to play an even greater part, because it has done excellent work in the past.
What worries me about the Clause is that my right hon. Friend said on Second Reading:
Clause 23 enables Her Majesty by Order in Council to transfer to the Secretary of State any or all of the functions of the Prison Commissioners and, if all these functions are transferred, to dissolve the Prison Commission as a statutory authority."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1960; Vol. 630, c. 574 and 575.]
This worries me very much. Is it to be done in a piecemeal fashion? Are we to have Orders in Council taking away some powers now and others later? The words "any" and "all" and "if" make it very difficult to know exactly what procedure is anticipated and what the precise position of the Prison Commissioners will be in the future. Will they be left with just a few functions, the rest being taken over by the Home Secretary?
I should like consideration to be given to the retention of the Commissioners. During the Standing Committee I heard no argument that convinced me that they were not doing a very admirable job. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) did not agree with many of us, but he has great experience and even he did not produce very convincing arguments that this Commission, which has the duty to help the prison governors and others to carry out their work, should be abolished, particularly now, when there are exceptional difficulties on which guidance is needed.
I shall not go over all the details that were very fully discussed in Committee. My right hon. Friend has had the opportunity to read them. I hope that he has considered them and will also consider the further points that have been put forward this evening and reconsider this abolition of the Prison Commissioners. As I feel he stressed on Second Reading, the Commissioners have done admirable work in the past, have been refortified recently, and should be allowed to carry on with their work.

Mr. Weitzman: It is a very great pity that such an important matter should have to be discussed at this late hour. It is a subject that obviously arouses much interest in many quarters. Many hon. Members, I am sure, would like to take part in the discussion, but we have had a very long day and many of us are jaded. It is very unfortunate, indeed, that the subject should have to be discussed in this way.
This proposal has roused great interest and much criticism in many quarters. I do not know of any newspaper that has commented favourably on it. I, too, would like to know what the Home Secretary has in mind about this change. The Prison Commissioners are a corporate body, established a long time ago. They have a long tradition of useful service, we know who they are, the work they do and the reforms they have put in hand from time to time. They are looked up to with respect.
What the reason for this change is, I do not know. It is said that this is a corporate body responsible to the Home Office and that, because of that, and because of the Commissioners' close link with the Home Office, they should in some way be absorbed into it. The Home Secretary may say that the change is intended to keep the Commissioners in closer touch with Home Office affairs.
I am not concerned with any such answer: my concern is with the wide powers given to any Home Secretary by subsection (1) of the Clause, which reads
Subject to the provisions of this section, Her Majesty may by Order in Council make provisions for transferring to the Secretary of State any or all of the functions of the Prison Commissioners…
As I read those words, although the Home Secretary may now say that this

is just a slight change and intended to be a good thing, what, in effect, we are doing here, is to give wide powers to any future Home Secretary to do what he likes about any or all of the functions or the Prison Commissioners, and to absorb them in the Home Office in any way he thinks fit.
Frankly, I am afraid that if they are so absorbed we may get a good deal of red tape—and I say that advisedly. I know that the Home Office does wonderful work and I do not want my criticism to be taken wrongly, but we have had considerable experience in the Standing Committee of the difficulty of getting information and reports. As has already been pointed out, in Standing Committee we sought much information and got very little, and we had to criticise the fact that many reports might have been forthcoming but were not made available. Is the same thing to happen to the Prison Commissioners and to the work that they do?
10.15 p.m.
We should have a satisfactory explanation for this proposal before the Clause is adopted. I should like to see the present system continued. If it is desired to bring the work of the Prison Commissioners up to date, that is another matter, which can be done by dealing with them as a corporate body and by giving them further powers and further assistance. What I am afraid of is that if the powers laid down in the Clause are given to the Home Secretary there will be real danger to a body which has done so much good in the past.

Mr. Deedes: I should like my right hon. Friend to clarify one point in my mind. How long historically has it been established that the Prison Commissioners and their staff are part of the hierarchy which forms part of the Home Office?
It is important to establish precisely what we are losing. If we are losing a body of individuals outside the orbit of the Home Office who have always been independent of, shall I say, the hierarchy through which they may be promoted to high office in the Home Office, we should be losing something of value. Independent judgment, independent advice, and the ability to disagree at times with everyone in the Home


Office might be an important function of the Prison Commissioners, but, as I understand it, the Chairman of the Prison Commissioners and his staff have been fairly closely integrated for some time with the, as it were, ladder of promotion by which people can enter the Home Office or, perhaps, any other Department. I think that this is a matter of some importance, and I should like my right hon. Friend to explain what is new in the Clause.

Sir T. Moore: It is with the utmost reluctance that, once again, I find myself engaged in controversy with my right hon. Friend. All that I wish to ask him is what the Prison Commissioners have done to deserve the abolition of their existing functions. I have made many inquiries about this matter since the Committee stage. The Prison Commissioners have earned the trust, confidence and respect, not only of the general public, but of the prison staffs and of the prisoners themselves.
Independence is a very important thing in life. If a person has a reputation for independence, his judgment and character are assessed accordingly. If he has the reputation of being tied to a certain theory without bringing his judgment into play, the value of his opinion is lost.
I venture to express an opinion on this matter, because I have tried to discover from those intimately concerned what are the functions of the Prison Commissioners which, if they were abolished, might be destroyed and those which, if incorporated in the Home Office, might be improved. I gather that it is felt that if their sense of independence, even if it is only on paper, were wiped out, an enormous amount of harm will be done to the good work which the Prison Commissioners are able to do because of their so-called independence.
Like myself, the public are inclined to regard the Civil Service as something detached and isolated from human contacts and therefore not able easily to assess public opinion. The public feel that the Prison Commissioners are an independent body whose judgment and decisions they can accept, knowing that they are not part and parcel of what my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford

(Mr. Deedes) has called the hierarchy or the Establishment.
There is another feeling about the matter in this House; I do not know about feeling concerning it in the country. The members of the Prison Commission are men of high integrity, as the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) said in Committee. They are men of distinction in public life. They have rightly gained the trust of the community. Many people feel that if the Prison Commission is abolished, civil servants will be appointed by seniority, so to speak, to control the duties of the Commission, instead of members being appointed because of their suitabilty or qualification for the job.
I know that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has given the matter great thought and where his sympathies lie. I hope, therefore, than on this occasion he will give way to his sympathies and allow the Prison Commissioners to carry on with the excellent work that they have so often done.

Mr. Michael Foot: It must be quite an experience for the hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) to find himself in respectable company. When he finds himself agreeing with what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon), by the hon. Lady the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Miss Vickers) and even by myself, strange circumstances have arisen.
It may be that these strange circumstances arise because the Clause has nothing to do with the Bill. It could have been in any other kind of Bill, but it has little to do with the other matters which have been discussed generally during the course of the present Bill. One charitable explanation for this state of affairs is that the Home Secretary knew that today and during the course of the Bill, he would be having to take a number of objectionable courses, and would have to be resisting some obviously intelligent Amendments moved from this side of the House, but that he thought it would be a good thing to have one Clause in reserve which he could gracefully throw away and say that he would not press in view of the strong representations made to him from the other side of the House.
I cannot help feeling that that is the real reason why the Home Secretary has incorporated the Clause in the Bill. Therefore, whilst we must all go through the motions of pressing the right hon. Gentleman to withdraw it, I am sure that he will do so with his usual grace. Indeed, he can do it on this occasion with the absolute certainty that he will not be stabbed in the back from the other side. I hope that, for all these reasons, the Home Secretary will make the withdrawal. I apologise to him in advance if, by spilling the beans in this way, if I may put it in that crude manner, I have deprived him of the peroration that he was about to deliver.
However, just on the off-chance that the Clause was introduced seriously—it has lasted through quite a long period during the discussion of the Bill—I would address just a few arguments to the merits of the matter. As I say, I hope that the Home Secretary will withdraw it. Whichever way he withdraws it, I do not mind. It would be a good deed for him in a naughty week if he were to withdraw the Clause. However, on the merits of the matter, if, indeed, the proposal is seriously meant, it bears all the marks of a tidy, bureaucratic arrangement. It looks as if the Home Office saw the opportunity, possibly, of getting the Clause through without any great controversy and that it would tidy things up from the point of view of those in the Home Office. They have always been a bit jealous of the independence exercised by the Prison Commission and they thought that they could put things right. As we have been informed, they have been trying to do it for a number of years and they think that it would be a tidy, bureaucratic arrangement to change things in this manner.
I cannot claim to have the experience of many other hon. Members who have spoken in this debate, but I have spoken to some of those who have been associated with the Prison Commission. One of the main virtues of the Commission, I understand, is that it is manned by people who have had intimate experience of actually running prisons, people who have worked in prisons, who have been governors of prisons, who have, perhaps, some of them, though not all, given up the whole of their lives to this kind of work which, as everybody recognises, is a very distinct and peculiar kind of work.
One danger for the Commission in this transfer to the Home Office I should have thought is that there will be curtailment of the numbers of people on the Commission or doing its work who have intimate experience of this work in prisons themselves. Although civil servants are very good people in their place, I do not think they are the proper people to run the Prison Commission. I do not think anyone who is a civil servant and has spent most of his life in the Home Office will know very much about what happens in prisons or about what kind of attitude should be taken to the various problems which arise there.
So I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will reconsider his proposal. After all, as has been said, there has been widespread opposition to it. As far as I can discover, the only defence so far made by the Home Secretary of his proposition is that he is not really intending to do what the Clause apparently says he will do, that he intends to do something rather different. However, as has already been said, the Clause is so widely drafted and contains such wide powers for the Home Office that, if we were to pass it today, even with all the assurances which, no doubt, the Home Secretary would give, it would still be possible in a matter of months or years for this Clause to be used radically to alter the position of the Prison Commission and the independence which it has exercised.
The Home Office is a Department which has to deal with a vast variety of subjects, and surely it is not asking too much that an independent voice should be retained in this respect, that the Commissioners should be able to retain the independence which at present they have, and that nothing should be done to merge them further in the Home Office.
So I hope that the right hon. Gentleman, even if he does it because of the motives I suggested at the beginning, will on this occasion say he has been persuaded by all the arguments presented in this House, and, indeed, by everyone, so far as I can see, who has had anything at all to say on the subject during the controversy there has been about it, for, as far as I can see,


there has not been a single supporter of this proposal by the Home Secretary. I hope that he will take that into account. I hope he will agree with this Amendment, but if he does not, if he does intend to go ahead with this proposal, he really must present a much

fuller argument for it than he attempted to give, for example, to some of our arguments on other matters, when he gave only most cursory answers. I hope he will give us a much more adequate explanation than he has so far given of his proposal.

Dame Irene Ward: I gain the impression that my right hon. Friend has deliberately played down quite a long time the idea which is embodied in this Clause—the abolition, really, of the Prison Commission. I was very interested when the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) said that on Second Reading—it is my impression also—very little was said about this proposal. As I said on another occasion, I was not a member of the Standing Committee, and, therefore, I do not really know what was said in the Standing Committee, but I think it is very important that we should understand why this very important matter should have been put into a Bill of this kind without any preparation beforehand by my right hon. Friend for this tremendous alteration in the administration of the Home Office.
10.30 p.m.
I find it very difficult to understand. Generally speaking, when we are going to make an alteration of this kind in a body which has grown up in the minds of the country over a very long period, we look for some guidance, an expression of a point of view, from the Department concerned before Parliament is faced with the task of making a decision. I do not like this matter at all.
Further, when I heard the hon. Lady say that during the term of the Labour Government a predecessor of my right hon. Friend had also tried to include this proposal in the Criminal Justice Act, 1948, and it was turned down, I became even more suspicious. It implies to me that the civil servants inside the Home Office have tried, with success, to get successive Home Secretaries to deal with this matter as my right hon. Friend has tried to deal with it tonight. That kind of thing does not appeal to me at all.
We have been preparing for a new Criminal Justice Bill for some time, and I have tried to recollect whether I have ever heard the Home Secretary tell anybody, either his own back benchers or the Opposition, that the proposal was on the cards, so to speak, or whether it has ever been raised in the House. But I have no such recollection. Also, when my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes), who is supposed to have

been very closely in touch with the Home Office before he resigned his position and also holds a very prominent position in the Parliamentary Committee dealing with home affairs, has to get up and ask for some explanation, I become more and more suspicious. In other words, I do not like this proposition at all.

Mr. Deedes: I really must interrupt my hon. Friend. I am not responsible for abolishing the Prison Commissioners.

Dame Irene Ward: No, of course. I would not for one moment suggest that my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford should feel like that, All I am saying is that he has had to get up and ask for an explanation. Having regard to his position, first, as a former Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, and then as Chairman of the Conservative Home Affairs Committee, I should have thought that he would know what was in the mind of the Home Secretary. I am absolutely staggered at the position. I should have thought that at a suitable opportunity before this great Bill was brought before the House with this extraordinary addition to it, which, as an Opposition Member said, really has nothing to do with the Bill at all, my right hon. Friend would have asked my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford to see him in his room so that he could explain to him what it was that he wanted to do. I find it most extraordinary that there is no such liaison.
Yesterday I listened to my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford trying to support my right hon. Friend. I do not think he supported my right hon. Friend very well, though he was doing his best. He ought to have been properly briefed. I am not suggesting that my hon. Friend was not using his own brains, but he had obviously been briefed in a way to support my right hon. Friend. Yet, although I consider this to be a very important matter, my hon. Friend really does not know a thing about it, and has had to get up and ask my right hon. Friend to explain it.
I also noticed that my right hon. Friend did not try to intervene to give some explanation, so that we should know what his views were. I find that most extraordinary. In addition, I


noticed also the presence of the Attorney-General, who, if I remember rightly, when we were in opposition supported the removal of this proposal from the 1948 Act.

The Attorney-General: I supported this proposal in 1948.

Dame Irene Ward: I am very glad to hear it. I am bound to say, however, that I listened with fascination to him yesterday deploring one thing about magistrates and arguing the opposite today in order to get his way. I am finding it very difficult to know what we are trying to do.
I have come to the conclusion that the hour is very late. I cannot blame my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary for this discussion coming up now, but I think that he is probably very pleased that it has done so—although he will not say so. We have not a full House. This is the kind of thing about which the Conservative Party cares deeply. We do not believe in monopolies, yet my right hon. Friend is, in effect, creating a monopoly for his Department and doing away with the very small independent representation. I believe I am right in saying that if all these proposals had been known and discussed there would not have been such an adverse press. My right hon. Friend's public relations are very bad. I do not think that he has a single leg to stand on.
I do not accept what the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. M. Foot) said about this Clause being thrown in in order to try to smooth the ruffled feelings of back benchers on this side of the House. I do not think that that sort of thing enters the mind of my right hon. Friend. I do not think that he is a subtle person. He is very straightforward and he would not have thought of that. But I have been turning over in my mind how we can deal with what is to me a very important matter.
If there were a vote on this I should be in the Lobby against my right hon. Friend, but this Bill must go to another place, and in our debates we have given another place a lead on this matter. There are many pundits there who can deal with it more appropriately than a little back-bencher like me, getting up now without knowing a great deal about it. But I always think that women are

very good psychologists, and I have a hunch that this proposal is a bad one.
I am not going to talk any longer, but I hope that my right hon. Friend will reconsider his proposal. If he does not want to do anything about it tonight—I realise that it would be very embarrassing at this hour to have to give way—and if he cannot send for my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford, I hope that he will send for the spokesman for the Home Office in another place and brief him, so that we shall know what it was that he wanted to do. Whatever he wanted to do, I do not want.

Mr. V. Yates: The hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) has given us some delightful interpretations of what she believed to have been the case and would have found to be so had she been a member of the Standing Committee. What she said about the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) could have been emphasised over and over again with the questions which he put in Standing Committee and to which he should have known the answers, especially in view of his experience.
The hon. Lady was quite right to say that for many years attempts have been made to bring about this change, and the hon. Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) is to be congratulated on his opposition to it. His grounds for resisting the proposal, made by civil servants to several Home Secretaries, were as sound today as they were when he opposed a similar proposal in 1938.
Independence has been mentioned. If we were proposing to form a new Prison Commission, we would probably have to put it under the Home Office. But that is not the case. The Prison Commission has been operating since 1870 and independence has been the mark of its work.
My hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. M. Foot) said that the proposal had had a bad Press. The Times, the Guardian and the Economist have all considered it very seriously. On 7th February, the Guardian said:
Clause 23 of the Crinimal Justice Bill will enable the Home Secretary to abolish the Prison Commission and bring all matters of penal administration under the direct wing of the Home Office. There are sound reasons why this provision should be stoutly resisted, as it was successfully during the stages of the


Criminal Justice Bill in 1948. Ever since the Prison Commission was found in 1870 the autonomy of that body has helped in penal reform to an extent which cannot have been imagined as taking place if the administration had been handled by a department of a Ministry. Experiments in penal reform had generally been forthcoming whereas those administering the penal system have failed when under the direction of the Home Office—certainly under less enlightened Home Secretaries than Mr. Butler—many innovations would never have been tried.
That is a fact.
Independence has been exercised. The hon. Lady mentioned civil servants. Home Secretaries come and go—my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) was one—but the Civil Service, remains.

Sir T. Moore: Jolly good thing, too.

Mr. Yates: The civil servants keep bringing this proposal out of the pigeonholes.
10.45 p.m.
Apart from the opposition to which I have referred, I have visited the Prison Commissioners on many occasions during my sixteen years as a Member of this House. When I first went to the Home Office—and when I first went to the War Office—I was horrified by the sort of "pass in—pass out" attitude of the civil servants. When I went to Horse-ferry Road to see the Chairman of the Prison Commissioners, I was agreeably surprised by the accessibility—

Mr. R. A. Butler: Will the hon. Gentleman say when he has been to the Home Office and not been treated with courtesy? I should be very glad to look into it and put it right.

Mr. Yates: I did not mean to convey the impression that I had been received discourteously.

Mr. Butler: Will the hon. Gentleman say when he has been to the Home Office and not been well received?

Mr. Yates: I am not saying that I have not been well received. I am simply saying that under our system, which is not as bad as it was, when one visits the Home Office, or the War Office, one has to see the clerk at the counter and get a pass to go in, and so on. On the other hand, it is very easy to see the Prison Commissioners. If this proposal

were accepted, I doubt whether there would be the same accessibility to the Prison Commissioners.
I do not wish to make a general attack on civil servants. There are many reasons for their cautiousness. When I was in the United States of America I visited some of the prisons and I was informed that one of the Prison Commissioners, a lady, had been there to lecture about prisons. I do not think that civil servants are so free and independent in these matters.
One aspect of the proposal which I particularly oppose is the reference to the Order in Council. It is a nasty, unfair method, for this reason. If the Government have power to do something by an Order in Council, the House of Commons has no power to amend that Order. Who taught me that? It was the Attorney-General, because in 1947 I was opposed to the National Service Bill and the power to extend it by an Order in Council. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said:
It provides for some degree of Parliamentary control, but no one with any knowledge of the practice of this House can say it provides for full Parliamentary control when there is no power of amending the Order in Council."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 8th May, 1947, Vol. 437, c. 942.]
If the right hon. Gentleman wants to bring about this change, the right way to do it is by a special Bill. The case could then be argued. If the change is made by an Order in Council, we shall have no power to amend it. We will have power to vote on the Order, but no power to amend it. For that reason I oppose the Amendment.
I do not wish to imply that civil servants are discourteous, but over the years the Prison Commissioners have established an independence which is clearly and unmistakably understood by the public. It is known that they act with due regard to public feeling, and independence has been their watchword. I sincerely hope that there will be other thoughts on this matter. It is one which should be argued as part of an Act of Parliament. We should have had a full debate on an issue of this kind. I therefore hope that the Home Secretary will think again about it.

Mr. Hobson: The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Foot) said that no voice has ever been raised in favour of this


proposal, but I recollect that in Committee the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) advanced very cogent arguments in favour of it. We have not had the advantage of hearing from him this evening, but his arguments in Committee weighed forcibly with me because he had the experience of exercising the great office which he held.
Despite all the arguments advanced in Committee, however, one point has always troubled me. It is not the independence of the Prison Commissioners which one ought to regret losing, because it is probably true that in substance they are not independent but are subject to the direct orders of the Home Secretary; it is the loss of their separate responsibilty which is to be regretted. There is a world of difference between people who are part of the headquarters, as it were, exercising a subordinate responsibility under the Home Secretary, and a person who has a separate responsibility even though it is subject to the direction of the Home Secretary.
In my experience of the Army I found there was a world of difference between a staff officer, who is only one of the members of a staff which is subject to the orders of a commander and who is only partly responsible for an outside unit—because it is only his staff responsibility—and the actual individual with the command of that unit, who is doing nothing else, even though he is subject to the command of a superior headquarters. I hope that my right hon. Friend will be able to reassure the House that we are not losing something by abolishing the Prison Commissioners, in the sense that we are losing an independently exercised responsiblity.

Mr. R. A. Butler: I was informed yesterday evening that this Amendment was to be called, and I was glad to hear it, because although this matter was fully discussed in Committee the debate has shown that many Members would like a further explanation. Therefore, although the hour is late, I will attempt to give as full an explanation as I can, repeating many of the arguments given over the last fifteen years or so on this subject.
I am sorry that my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) has not been aware that this subject existed. I know that women are

always right, but in this case I am afraid that they are not omniscient. My hon. Friend asked me why the matter had not been aired in the Second Reading debate. In order to help her I wild repeat some of the arguments I used in that debate by quoting from the OFFICIAL REPORT, in order to save her the trouble of reading them and also to save me the trouble of making a fresh speech. There are many arguments, because this matter has raised much public interest, but I think that I can dissipate much of the anxiety which has been created. In the Second Reading debate I said:
the original division of responsibility between the Prison Commission as an executive authority and the Home Office, which is the Department concerned with policy, has disappeared."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1960; Vol. 630, c. 575.]
I said that on Second Reading because I have had the honour of being Her Majesty's principal Secretary of State for four years and I am aware of what is happening in the various departments either directly or indirectly under my control. It is the case that every single item of business in the Prison Commission comes more quickly on to my desk than other items dealing with the Home Office. The right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) nods his head in acknowledgement of that.
Questions of corporal punishment to which we were referring this afternoon come to me for personal signature, and so do questions of staff. Even chaplains' and other appointments are signed by me. There is more centralisation between the Prison Commission and the Home Office than is ever realised by the newspapers quoted by the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) or anyone who has taken part in this debate.
The position is that the Prison Commissioners, by the sheer distinction of the persons involved, have a very fine reputation. Sir Lionel Fox, who has recently retired, came from the Home Office. It may interest my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) to know that since 1895, on the personal plane, all the chairmen of the Prison Commission have been drawn from the Home Office. Some have spent years with the Commission and have returned to the Home Office for other duties. Similar movements have taken place at lower level.
If I have to answer my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford in detail, I should explain to him that we have had in the past interchanges between the two departments. I do not think there will be a very great change in future, except that if we are able to use the powers given us by Clause 23 we may be able to make some reasonable economies between the establishments of the two departments. As to the change of higher personnel, there has been this regular stream backwards and forwards. The present Chairman was appointed from the Home Office, and it may be that one day he will return to the Home Office; we cannot say. There has been a regular exchange throughout both the highest level and intermediate grades. That is the answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford.
What is the objective in taking these powers? In fact, the situation is practically an amalgamation today. Secondly, if I am to satisfy my hon. Friends, how am I to reassure the House that the Prison Commission will retain an independent character and personality and be able to make me reports of the type I have been in the habit of receiving and on which most of the penal reform today is based? It is not all due to me, but largely to the reports of the Prison Commission. It is natural for a Minister to want to have with him a body which can bring ideas to him. I think I can satisfy the House on both grounds. In the course of Second Reading, I referred to:
the modern need for further integration.
and said:
For example, links between the prison and probation services and between approved school and borstal services may in this manner be brought closer and, therefore, lead to better working.
I also said that I look forward to:
a wider organisation covering all Home Office responsibilities for criminal justice and the treatment of offenders."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1960; Vol. 630, c. 576.]
It seems a rather extraordinary situation that I am responsible for approved schools and the probation services as well as the whole development of penal policy and the Prison Commission is, so to speak, a quasi-independent statutory institution when in fact it is brought into touch with me at every hour of the day. All I claim that we can do under Clause

23 is to enable those services which ought to be linked together, as was illustrated in discussion of Clause 21 this afternoon, to be linked, the prison, probation and borstal services, so that in future they can work better together.
There has been reference to the constitutional question, which was raised partly by my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth, also by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Hobson) on separate responsibility by my hon. Friend the Member for Ayr (Sir T. Moore) and the hon. and learned Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman). I shall deal with the point of my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Miss Vickers) in a minute.
11.0 p.m.
There is a big constitutional reason why, in the modern age, we should make this alteration, and this was specially stressed by the right hon. Member for South Shields in the Standing Committee. The doctrine of full Ministerial responsibility to this House is fundamental to our whole system of Government. This is not being done for petty reasons of tidiness in the Civil Service. The object is to support a constitutional principle. This is the second big reason that I am giving the House before dealing with some minor reasons.
I do not know whether hon. Members remember the Report of the Departmental Committee on Scottish Administration of 1938 which resulted in the amalgamation of the Prisons Department of Scotland with the Scottish Home Office. I do not say that we should always follow Scotland—especially as there are practically no Scottish hon. Members present tonight—[HON. MEMBERS: "There are."] I am sorry—there are some Scottish hon. Members present tonight.
I should like to read out this fundamental constitutional doctrine from this document. It says:
It is a constitutional principle that a Department and its Minister are indistinguishable, but a Department incorporated and established by statute to carry out specified functions in the name of the Department, although acting under the control and direction of the Minister, is necessarily regarded as a separate entity. We consider that this is an anomaly which should be rectified. The


responsibility of the Minister to Parliament is inconsistent with any measure of independence (even if only apparent) in any Department for which he speaks.
That is, I believe, the basis of the future organisation of the Prison Commission in relation to the Home Office; that is to say, if we do take powers under this Order, and if the Order is laid before the House—we are not absolutely decided on taking the powers, but it is likely—it will be seen that the object is to establish the constitutional principle of a Secretary of State answerable to Parliament. I do not therefore see that Parliament can object when a Minister is donning the pure robe of constitutional doctrine, as I am attempting to do now—

Mr. Weitzman: Does that mean that the Commissioners will be a corporate body?

Mr. Butler: They will cease to be a statutory body on their own—and the hon. and learned Gentleman's intervention leads me to my next point.
I think that the emotional attachment to the existing state of affairs is an endearing example of the innate conservatism and attachment to tradition of most Englishmen of all parties—and I say this to pay a special tribute to the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. M. Foot). We have found that in all parts of the House there is a happy liaison between my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth, the hon. Members for Ebbw Vale, Ladywood and everyone else. The lion and the lamb are lying down together, and I hope that I can embrace them all before I finish my speech.
I shall now give them a very simple reassurance. There is really nothing at all in the fear that the disappearance of the Prison Commissioners as a separate statutory body will destroy what is valuable in the tradition relating to the Commission. I have discussed the matter with the Chairman of the Prison Commission, and have given him a personal assurance—which he has accepted and which he has discussed with his own subordinates in the prison service—that the Prisons Board, as a team of administrative and professional officials, will continue.
That means that they will have their own office. The hon. Member for Lady-wood will find at Horseferry Road exactly the same atmosphere as always. I defy him to observe the slightest difference as a result of this change. He will find the Prisons Board and the head of the service there, and will find that the Prisons Board is independent and able to give me its advice.
I want now to come to the most vital thing, which is that I insist in this reorganisation that the Chairman of the Prison Commission shall continue to report to me, as was done in the day of Sir Lionel Fox and is now done by Mr. Peterson. The Chairman has always reported to me through the Permanent Under-Secretary of, State. Therefore, the idea that there was a Commission that had an independent life and reported to me independently was not true, because the reports have always come to me through the Permanent Under-Secretary, as they will do in the future.
On the question of publicity—that is, the principle of the Commissioners being able to speak in the country and to address gatherings interested in penal reform—I give the undertaking that there will be no difference. In the past, the Prison Commissioners have been able to attend meetings and express their views on penal reform, and it is my intention that that should continue.
Therefore, I do not think that in this method which is planned for undertaking the main services of penal reform there will be any difference in the independence of the men, or character of the Commission, or in its chances for making publicity for penal reform: nor in its independence of judgment. Furthermore, there will be no change in the type of civil servant. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Ebbw Vale said he did not want civil servants to be prison governors, but I do not think that governors of prisons or borstals, or detention centres, will be in any way altered. I do not anticipate that the general standard of the service will be altered. This matter has been discussed with them, and I believe that they understand what I mean. I should very like my words to go to them this evening in the knowledge that they are going on with their noble work as they have in the past.
I have been asked if this will alter the position of the boards of visitors, which in borstals, and certain types of prison, are appointed by the Secretary of State. It may be suggested that these bodies have the function of keeping an independent watch, on his behalf, on the management of these establishments by the Prison Commissioners, and that if the Home Secretary became directly responsible for their management, the boards of visitors would lose this independence.
This view is mistaken. There will not be any difference because of this Bill. They will continue to have direct access to me as Secretary of State, and any official actions or policy with which they may disagree will be no more and no less than heretofore the actions or policy of officials who are responsible to the Secretary of State. These are the main reasons why I have thought it wise to have these powers in the Bill.

Mr. Charles A. Howell: I am grateful to the Home Secretary. Before leaving that point, I wonder if he would explain the reason why he says he will achieve this by Order? Why has he put this matter so that there will have to be an Order in Council rather than having a specific Clause in the Bill to abolish the Commissioners? Would it not have been tidier, to say nothing of being more honest and straightforward, to have had a Clause stating that the Commissioners would be abolished at this stage?

Mr. Butler: That raises a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Devonport. In taking these powers there will be much detailed complication; much too much for us to have put the matter in this Bill. We thought it better to see it set out in the form of an Order in Council than to include all the material in a Bill of this sort. That procedure will also have the merit of giving us more time for consideration, and I will give the assurance that when the Order does come before the House there will be full opportunity for it to be considered and that, if it is prayed against, I shall personally be here to answer points; and further than that, I will make it my business to study all of them. I think that that also answers the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Stoke Newington and the hon. Member

for Ladywood. I am personally responsible for our debate this evening because we are fully aware of the great importance which is attached to this change.

Mr. MacColl: The right hon. Gentleman says that the Order may be prayed against, and, therefore, one would understand that it will be subject to the negative procedure. I thought that it would be subject to the affirmative procedure. Is that not correct?

Mr. Butler: It will be an ordinary Order in Council subject to the negative procedure—[Interruption.] I am sorry, but that is a mistake of mine. If this will be under the affirmative procedure, then that of itself provides an even greater safeguard for the House.
I sum up by answering my hon. Friend the Member for Ayr about the Commissioners. The Commissioners have earned our trust. I have absolutely no doubt that in the new arrangements they can continue to earn our trust. I have no doubt that the separate organisation of the prisons can continue under this scheme. I have no doubt that the Prisons Board will continue. I have no doubt that we shall be able to recruit the same types of men as in the past, particularly with regard to the fact that they have so often been transferred from the Home Office. In answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth, I have no doubt that we shall not find anything mysterious, underhand or difficult in this organisation. I believe that in the future, we must look to a much wider bringing together of the various services for which the Secretary of State is responsible. I believe that it will prevent waste.
The expression was used by my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth that this was a case of a Conservative creating a monopoly. It is nothing of the sort. It is the case of a Conservative establishing the constitutional doctrine that the Departments responsible to him are responsible through him to the House of Commons. That is all I am trying to do. That is no constitutional innovation. It is as old as time. It is embraced not only by Conservatives, but it should be embraced by the House itself.

Mr. Ede: In the course of his remarks, the Home Secretary alluded to the fact


that the new Chairman of whatever body takes the place of the Prison Commission, and for the time being of the Prison Commission, will be Mr. Peterson. I went across to the United States of America a few months after Mr. Peterson had also gone to several of the cities that I visited and addressed several of the universities which had invited me to come and see them. Throughout the whole of that journey, the warmest appreciation was expressed of Mr. Peterson's services, of his knowledge of prison reform and of the help which he had given to the American officers in a similar position.
Mr. Peterson was at one time my private secretary and I want to wish him well in his new appointment and to congratulate the Home Secretary on having given him the opportunity of using his great talents in this exalted position.

Amendment negatived.

Miss Bacon: I beg to move,
That further consideration of the Bill, as amended, be now adjourned.
We have got on very well today and we have switched our minds from one subject to another. Sometimes they have been very varying subjects. I should like to ask the Home Secretary what are his intentions. Although we have got on well, there is still quite a lot of the Bill to be considered, including the important question of after-care, as well as the Third Reading, which cannot be taken formally and on which there must be discussion.

Mr. R. A. Butler: I am afraid I must insist that we finish consideration of the Bill. The only alternative is to go on tomorrow night, because the Bill has in due course to proceed to its final legislative conclusion in another place. If we have to defer any part of the Bill to tomorrow night, we do not want to defer too much. The remaining portion on the Order Paper consists really of one main Amendment to the First Schedule, which my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General is here to consider. It would be unreasonable not to finish consideration of the Bill this evening.
I should prefer to take the Third Reading tonight. If, however, representations are made to me to take it tomorrow night

after we have finished our business after ten o'clock I would consider those representations. I would, however, prefer to finish consideration of the Bills as on the Order Paper tonight, and I think that we could do that comparatively easily. My right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General is present to deal with the point which will be raised on the First Schedule and there are not many other major points to be dealt with on consideration on the Bill as on the Order Paper. Therefore, I am afraid that that should be our programme for this evening.

11.15 p.m.

Mr. Thomas Steele: I draw to the right hon. Gentleman's attention a very important Amendment to the Third Schedule headed
Application to Scotland, Northern Ireland, Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.
An explanation of this will certainly be required. This long Amendment replaces Part II of the Schedule in the Bill and inserts provisions affecting Scotland. It deals with probation officers and aftercare officers.
I and some of my hon. Friends from Scotland have been sitting here for a long time because we want an explanation of these provisions. I suggest that there is more in the situation than meets the eye, and I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will give us time tomorrow for this issue.

Mr. Butler: I am aware of that Amendment. The Attorney-General is here to give that explanation. I consider that we should make an attempt to conclude the Amendments on the Order Paper. That is reasonable. There has been a good spirit, and I am indebted to the House for the manner in which hon. Members have co-operated. We have got through a great deal of work. I think that when he is given the explanation the hon. Member for Dunbartonshire, West (Mr. Steele) will find that the position is not as bad as he thinks. We had better proceed.

Mr. Steele: Will the answer be given by a Scottish Minister or by the Attorney-General?

Mr. Butler: My right hon. and learned Friend points out that it is not solely a Scottish matter, but if the hon. Member


is keen to be assisted by a Scottish Minister I will see what I can do.

Question put and negatived.

Clause 24.—(TRANSFER TO SERVE SENTENCE.)

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 17, line 16, to leave out "(or treated as sentenced)".
This is a drafting Amendment. It may be glad news to the House if I point out that all the Amendments down to and including the Amendment to page 24, line 20, are drafting Amendments, either consequential on Amendments already made or put down to improve the language of the Bill. Bearing that in mind, the House may consider it convenient to take all these Amendments together.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I take it that that is convenient to the House.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In page 17, line 29, leave out subsection (5) and insert:
(5) Where a person sentenced to imprisonment or detention is released and, by reason of his having been transferred under this section, his release occurs otherwise than in his place of sentence (that is to say, the part of the United Kingdom or island in which his sentence was passed)—

(a) he shall not on his release be subject to supervision under the law of the part of the United Kingdom in which he is at the time of his release unless he would have been subject to supervision if he had been released at that time in his place of sentence without having been transferred from that place; and
(b) if in accordance with the foregoing provisions of this section he is on his release subject to supervision under the law of the part of the United Kingdom in which he is at the time of his release, the period after his release for which he is under such supervision shall not extend beyond the expiration of the maximum period after his release for which he could have been under supervision under the law of his place of sentence if he had been released in that place at the said time:

Provided that this subsection shall not apply in the case of a parson sentenced in any of the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man to borstal training, corrective training or preventive detention
(6) In subsection (5) of this section, any reference to a person as being subject to supervision includes a reference to his being liable to have imposed on him requirements or conditions

to be complied with by him or to be recalled or returned to a prison or other institution, and "under supervision" shall be construed accordingly.—[Mr. Renton.]

Clause 30.—(SUPERVISION AND RECALL.)

Amendments made: In page 20, line 35, leave out subsection (1) and insert—
(1) The enactments mentioned in the next following subsection, so far as they make provision—

(a) for the supervision of persons released from a prison or other institution in any part of the United Kingdom;
(b) for the imposition upon persons so released of requirements or conditions to be complied with by them; or
(c) for the recall or return of persons so released to such a prison or institution,

shall apply to a person so released who is for the time being in any other part of the United Kingdom or in the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man; and for that purpose those enactments shall extend throughout the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.

In page 21, line 8, at end insert "Second".—[Mr. Renton.]

Clause 36.—(CONSTRUCTION OF REFERENCES TO SENTENCES OF IMPRISONMENT, ETC.)

Amendments made: In page 24, line 1, after "court," insert "(including a court-martial)."

In page 24, line 5, at end insert
and
(d) without prejudice to paragraph (c) of this subsection, any reference to a person on whom a sentence of any description has been passed includes a reference to a person who under the law of any part of the United Kingdom, any of the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man is treated as a person on whom a sentence of that description has been passed;
and 'sentenced' shall be construed accordingly."—[Mr. Renton.]

Clause 37.—(INTERPRETATION.)

Amendments made: In page 24, line 20, at end insert "and any officer exercising jurisdiction under section forty-nine of the Naval Discipline Act, 1957."

In page 25, line 2, after "awarded," insert "by a court-martial."—[Mr. Renton.]

First Schedule.—(SUPERVISION OF PERSONS RELEASED FROM DETENTION CENTRES.)

Mr. MacColl: I beg to move, in page 27, line 13, at the end to insert:
In the case of any person in respect of whom there is in existence at the date of his


release, a probation order made under section three of the Criminal Justice Act, 1948, the probation officer shall be specified in the notice given under the foregoing paragraph.
This Amendment arises out of a discussion which we had on a comparable Amendment upstairs in Committee. The short point is, I think, quite a straightforward one, and I do not think that there is really very much disagreement about it.
The Schedule provides for supervision of persons coming out of detention centres and that the supervision may be exercised by various people or associations. The words used are:
… such society or person as may be specified in a notice to be given to him by the Prison Commissioners….
The difficulty which we considered might arise was where a boy was already on probation at the time when he was sent to a detention centre. We feel that when such a boy comes out of detention it is obviously desirable that the supervision should be exercised by the probation officer who was supervising him under the probation order. In other words, there should not be two different supervising officers engaged with the same person.
I understood from the discussion upstairs that, in practice, it was the intention that this should be done, but there is nothing in the Schedule to indicate that at all. There is no means of being sure that the Prison Commissioners will, in fact, designate the probation officer in that case. Therefore, the Amendment seeks to provide that in the case of any person in respect of whom there is in existence at the date of his release a probation order, the probation officer shall be specified in the notice to which I have already referred. That would make it quite clear that there would not be parallel supervision by two supervising officers.
As I say, I do not think that there is any difference of opinion in principle on this matter, but only the question of establishing with clarity what will be the practice.

The Attorney-General: The hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) raised this point in Committee, and I well remember the discussion that we then had. He was concerned to see that there was no danger or the possibility of dual responsibility of supervision.

I said that I would consider whether any Amendment was necessary. I understand that my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State has already informed the hon. Gentleman that in our view it is not. I do not think that it is really necessary to legislate in order to make express provision for this when it is obvious common sense to secure that there shall be one person only responsible for supervising when a person is under supervision and is at the same time on probation.
I could go into the administrative detail as to the manner in which that will be secured, but doubt whether the hon. Gentleman would really want me to do that. It is the intention to see that there is not confusion of the kind that he fears, and power is given by the Bill, through the appointment of the society, to ensure that the appropriate steps are taken to avoid that duality of responsibility in an individual case which would be stupid and embarrassing.

Mr. MacColl: I find it an extraordinarily startling doctrine that the right hon. and learned Gentleman has produced at this late hour, that what is obvious and common sense is necessarily done administratively. However, apparently he is satisfied that all the loopholes are stopped. He mentioned that I had had a letter from his hon. and learned Friend. I very much appreciate the hon. and learned Gentleman's courtesy in writing to me, but I thought it desirable that an authoritative statement should be made on this matter in the House so that it would be quite clear what the position was. I am a little surprised that it is not necessary or desirable to have an Amendment. However, I am quite satisfied to accept the Attorney-General's view on that, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. MacColl: I beg to move, in page 27, line 14, to leave out from the beginning to "and" in line 19 and to insert:
Any person who being under supervision under paragraph 1 of this Schedule fails to comply with any requirement for the time being specified in the notice given to him under that paragraph, may be sent to a detention centre by order of a magistrates' court".

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think it might be convenient to discuss at the same time the next Amendment, in line 24, leave out from "later" to end of line 32 and insert:
Provided that a person shall not be sent to a detention centre under this paragraph mote than once by virtue of the same order under section four of this Act.
3. Subject to the following provisions of this Schedule, the Magistrates' Courts Act, 1952, and any other enactment relating to summary proceedings, shall apply in relation to proceedings for an order under paragraph 2 above as they apply in relation to proceedings in respect of a summary offence, and references in those enactments to an offence, trial, conviction or sentence shall be construed accordingly.
4. Proceedings for an order under paragraph 2 above may be brought in a magistrates' court having jurisdiction in the area in which the person under supervision resides; but no summons or warrant shall be issued for the purposes of such proceedings under section one of the Magistrates' Courts Act, 1952, except upon information laid by or on behalf of the Prison Commissioners.
5. A warrant issued under the said section one for the purposes of proceedings for an order under the said paragraph 2 may, if the person laying the information so requests, bear an endorsement requiring any constable charged with its execution to communicate with the Prison Commissioners before arresting the person under supervision if the constable finds that that person is earning an honest livelihood or that there are other circumstances which ought to be brought to the notice of the Commissioners.
6. If, on the hearing of any such proceedings, the court is satisfied that the person under supervision has failed to comply with any of the requirements of his supervision but is of opinion, having regard to all the circumstances of the case, that it is unnecessary or inexpedient to send him hack to a detention centre, the court may make no order in the case.

Mr. MacColl: That would be helpful to the discussion, Mr. Deputy-Speaker.
This is another example, and not by any means the only one in the Bill, of some of the confusion and difficulty that has arisen as we have proceeded with the Bill in the Standing Committee and in the House. When the Bill was originally presented to the House it contained a provision for after-care of people released from prison, a provision which provided for the establishment of recall boards. It also provided for the aftercare of persons released from detention centres. I do not think there was much to choose between the two schemes, which were in the First Schedule and the

original Third Schedule, but, if anything, that in the First Schedule was the better of the two.
However, in the course of the proceedings on the Bill the Government produced a new Third Schedule which abandoned the idea—in response to a good deal of criticism both on Second Reading and in Committee—of the recall boards, and established the principle for after-care of prisoners that the sanction behind the after-care should be recall to prison by the courts and not by an administrative board called a recall board.
Parliamentary procedure being what it is, at the time when we were considering the First Schedule we could not be sure what the precise form of the Third Schedule would be. Therefore, there was not, I thought, a very good case for asking for the First Schedule to be amended to be in line with the Third Schedule until we knew what the Third Schedule was going to be. Once the Third Schedule had been finalised, it became possible, as it is now, to have another look at the First Schedule to see whether it could not also be brought a little closer to what I now think is on the whole a very good Third Schedule. I most warmly welcome, as I think everybody who has any knowledge of these questions does, the introduction of the idea of after-care for persons released from detention centres. That is an excellent part of the Bill with which I would have no quarrel at all.
11.30 p.m.
The only question at issue is the form that should be adopted as a sanction for people who do not carry out the requirements of the supervision. It is beyond argument that if we are to have effective supervision we have to have some sanction. I would not quarrel with the view that the sanction ought to be recall to a detention centre, as outlined in the First Schedule. The only question of substance that arises is, by whom is this discretion to recall to be exercised?
The purpose of our Amendment is more or less to lift the idea of the principle of the Third Schedule, which applies to people released from prison, and to apply it to those released from detention centres. It seems tidy and consistent to do so, and I therefore hope


that it will be acceptable to the Government. Virtually, we propose that anybody who does not fulfil the requirements of his supervision should be sent to a detention centre by order of a magistrates' court, and that the Magistrates' Courts Act shall also apply to those proceedings. This means that there would be a full right of appeal. That is the point to which the hon. Member for Carlton (Sir K. Pickthorn) attached great importance both on Second Reading and in Committee, and many other hon. Members wished to see a right of appeal.
In the Third Schedule there is a right of appeal because the proceedings for return to prison are now regarded as being proceedings under the Magistrates' Courts Act, with the normal right of appeal to the appeal committee of quarter sessions, for which that Act provides. Therefore, I cannot see why, if we do it for the prisoner, we should not also apply the process of an order by a magistrates' court, subject to the right of appeal to the appeal committee to those released from detention centres.
I do not want to labour this by going into an exhaustive account of what the words mean, but the two main points are that the decision should not be taken by the Prison Commissioners—who, to some extent, must be regarded as a little biased—but should be taken, on application, by a magistrates' court, and that it should be subject to the right of appeal if there is any dispute—an appeal which goes not only to the legal correctness of the call but also to the substance of whether or not it is the best way of dealing with the matter.
The magistrates' court would not be bound to make an order. It would have a discretion to consider the circumstances and decide accordingly. I am in my most amenable mood and think that the Third Schedule is, as a whole, excellent, and that the Government have done a good job in working out this procedure, for which our thanks must be given. But I do want to see it applied also to the First Schedule, because what is sauce for the somewhat elderly goose of the prisoner released from prison should be sauce for the young gander who comes from the detention centre.

The Attorney-General: I am grateful to the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) for his observations about the Third Schedule. I agree that it is now much improved from what it was when the Bill was first introduced.
The Third Schedule deals with the possibility that a person recalled from supervision under that Schedule will be liable to be imprisoned for a further six months in addition to the sentence passed on him by the court before which he had been tried and at which he had been sentenced for his offence. It is right that the matter should go before a magistrates' court before he has to serve an additional sentence of that period.
The situation under the First Schedule is quite different, and the difference in terms was deliberately made by the Government after very careful consideration. I, too, am in my most amenable and persuasive mood, and I hope that I shall be able to satisfy the hon. Member for Widnes that the arguments in favour of keeping the Schedule as it now stands are overwhelming.
First, for a long time it has been the practice for the Prison Commissioners to recall from licence those who have been released on licence and who have misconducted themselves in one way or another. That recall results in their serving the unexpired portion of their sentence. That is a well-known feature to all of us, and in paragraph 2 of the First Schedule a person who is recalled, after being placed under supervision, to a detention centre is to be liable
to be detained in the detention centre until the expiration of a period equivalent to that part of his term which was unexpired on the date of his release from the detention centre….
I pause there and make the point that so far the First Schedule is putting into a Schedule what is common practice for the recall from licence and that there is no possibility of the person so recalled having to serve something in addition to the original sentence of detention which was passed upon him.
The Schedule goes on to provide:
… or until the expiration of the period of fourteen days from the date of his being taken into custody under the order, which ever is the later …


It is conceivable that a case would arise where he might at most be kept in detention for a period of fourteen days in addition to the original sentence of detention.
Here we run into a practical difficulty. As a lawyer, I naturally like these matters to be brought before a court for adjudication, where that can be done, but we must have regard to the period of 14 days. I would not be in favour of a proposal which would add to that maximum period of 14 days the period during which the person subject to recall to the detention centre would be in custody before coming before the magistrates.
Supposing someone under supervision under this Schedule had disappeared and had then been found and it was desired to bring him back towards the end of the period of his detention, so that there was not much of the unexpired portion of his original sentence remaining, but that at the same time it was in his interests to bring him back and keep him there for a short period and perhaps try to get him on a new track; it is obvious that he could not be allowed out on bail once he had been found and he would therefore have to be kept in custody until he came before the magistrates. In some parts of the country he would come before the magistrates extremely quickly, but in others he would have to wait a week or a fortnight and that involves an enlargement of the period of additional detention of 14 days now prescribed in the Bill. There is that real difficulty. We do not want to extend the period of his detention in one form or another beyond that maximum period of fourteen days prescribed in line 23. There is no way of overcoming that problem and grafting the court procedure on to it.
Under the borstal provisions which have been in existence since 1908 there is machinery very similar to this for young offenders. If one is to draw a line between the kind of categories which come into the First Schedule and the kind of categories which really come into the Third Schedule, it is really this. Is the recall to be substantially a recall to serve the unexpired portion of the sentence, or does it mean, if it is brought about, a substantial addition, or may it mean a substantial addition, to the sentence imposed by the courts?
Under this Schedule it does not mean a substantial addition. We thought a lot about whether we could drop this power to detain the person until the expiration of the period of fourteen days, but we came to the conclusion that it was advisable to have it in the person's own interest otherwise it would not be worthwhile recalling him when there was very little left of the unexpired term on the date of his release.
Suppose that some person had behaved very badly and was released at the end of his time. If he was brought back he would not have to remain in detention for very long, and yet that might be the very person one would want to keep for a little longer period.
I suggest to the House that for those reasons it is desirable to have the power to have these extra fourteen days and that it is right to keep it at that, but if we keep it at that it is not possible to graft on to it the magistrates' court procedure without substantially enlarging that period of detention.

Mr. MacColl: I am not completely convinced, because there is the analogy of a breach of probation. Where there is a breach of probation—and that is on the whole a gentler procedure than the breach of supervision after detention—there has to be a summons to court, and if necessary a warrant and arrest if the probationer does not attend. There is no great injustice done to somebody who disappears, and even if he has to be arrested he can often be released with the warrant backed for bail. If the procedure works fairly well in the case of a breach of probation I do not see why it should not work just as well in the case of a person released from detention.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman has gone to some pains to explain these technical difficulties, and in view of that I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Second Schedule.—(SUPERVISION OF PERSONS RELEASED FROM APPROVED SCHOOLS.)

Mr. Weitzman: I beg to move, in page 28, line 23, to leave out from "release" to the end of line 25.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Perhaps it might be convenient to discuss with that Amendment the Amendment in page 28, line 26, leave out paragraph 4.

Mr. Weitzman: Yes.
I should like to explain what the Amendment seeks to do. Clause 14 (1) provides the power to release a person from detention in an approved school at any time. Under paragraph 1 (1) of the Schedule he is subject to compulsory supervision in accordance with the provisions therein laid down. He is subject to such compulsory supervision for a period of two years from the date of his release or until he attains the age of 21, whichever is the earlier.
11.45 p.m.
Under those provisions, after his release the managers have power to recall him at any time. But the period of compulsory supervision runs from the date of the original release, so that if a child detained when he is 11 is released when he is 12 and recalled when he is 13, the period of compulsory supervision runs from the date of his release, that is, when he is 12 years of age, and therefore expires when he is 14, when he is still under detention. When he is released at the end of the period of detention there is no power to impose compulsory supervision, although that is the very time, when he is 15, that he requires it most.
It may be said that there is a provision for voluntary supervision, but that depends on the consent of the child concerned, and if he is the sort of child who needs supervision it is very unlikely that he will consent. The alteration which the Bill makes in the law concerning supervision is regarded with much apprehension by many headmasters of approved schools. They take the view that it is most important that when persons are released at the end of a period of detention, particularly with boys of 15, there should be a power to impose a period of compulsory supervision. I raised this matter in Committee and the Parliamentary Secretary was good enough to say that he appreciated the importance of it and would look into it. Since then he has been good enough to write to me commenting on the matter, and I saw that the comments he made

were passed on to the headmasters' association, so that they might be appreciated by that organisation.
These headmasters are persons of very practical experience, and they take the view that by limiting the period of compulsory supervision and dating it from the original release we are causing a difficulty. They feel that from a practical point of view, whenever a child is released there should be a period of compulsory supervision. They also feel that at the end of a period of detention, if the child concerned is 15 years of age there should be a period of compulsory supervision.
In putting down the Amendment I have sought to cut out the words which provide that the period shall run from the date of the original release. In other words, I have sought to provide that there should be a period of compulsory supervision after any release, whether it be before the period of detention has expired or at the end of that period. It may be said that this is a rather clumsily-worded Amendment. I tried to draft it a little more adroitly, but it is extremely difficult to do so in a complicated Schedule of this kind. I thought I ought to get the point clearly before the House by wording the Amendment in this way.
I put it before the House on this basis. Here we have headmasters of approved schools with many years of practical experience who feel that a real difficulty has been created by this provision and that there ought to be provision for compulsory supervision after any release, and certainly after the period of detention has come to an end.

Mr. Renton: We have considered very carefully the views which the hon. and learned Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) has put forward tonight, of which he was kind enough to give us previous notice. The effect of his first Amendment would be that the two years period of compulsory supervision would start afresh whenever the young person was released after recall and would run for two years from the date of the second or subsequent release, unless meanwhile he reached the age of 21.
The second Amendment would delete the whole of paragraph 4, which is quite an important paragraph of this Second


Schedule. The paragraph which would be deleted makes provision in the case of a young person who is originally released from an approved school in England or Wales before the date on which the approved school after-care provisions of the Bill come into force, but, having been recalled to his school, is again released on or after that date. In that case the period of two years compulsory supervision, with liability to recall, is to be computed from the date of the original release under the old provisions.
We feel that both these Amendments must be resisted, and I hope I can carry the House with me on that. The indefinite prolongation of compulsory supervision by making it possible for the two-year period to start running afresh, perhaps twice, or even three times in a rare case, is contrary to the whole spirit of the after-care provisions of the Bill. The first Amendment would enable the managers of an approved school to use their power of recall in such a way as to keep a boy or girl under compulsory supervision—I stress the word "compulsory"—right up to the age of 20. Although there is no reason to suppose that managers would exercise their powers in that way, there seems no reason why it should be made even theoretically possible for them to do so. We feel we should steer clear of that danger.
We feel it important that the liability to after-care of people detained in approved schools like that of other offenders subject to after-care should be clearly defined and limited in time. We have gone out of our way to do that in regard to the compulsory supervision of adult offenders under the Third Schedule and we feel this principle should be applied to all types of after-care.
For these reasons, I must say that the Amendments do not find sympathy in our minds.

Miss Bacon: I should have thought there was a great deal of merit in the first Amendment. If a young person coming from an approved school has been released two or three times, which shows that that person has been back to the school two or three times, surely that is exactly the kind of person for whom

there should be a longer period of compulsory supervision. In this respect my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) has made a valid point in regard to his first Amendment.

Amendment negatived.

Third Schedule.—(SUPERVISION OF CERTAIN DISCHARGED PRISONERS.)

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 30, line 37, to leave out from beginning to "to" in line 40 and to insert:
a period equal to one third of the terra of imprisonment.
At first sight this looks like a simple drafting Amendment, but I must come clean and say that in certain circumstances it could turn out to be an Amendment of substance. Paragraph 5 of the Schedule provides for the return to prison of the person who fails to comply with an order of supervision, and also lays down the maximum period for which the person may be so returned.
The House will recollect from the terms of Part 1 of the Third Schedule—especially paragraph 5—that the maximum period may be whichever is the shortest of three periods, one of which is the maximum period of remission for good conduct that could be granted in respect of the term of imprisonment to which the person was originally sentenced. In the Bill as reported, the length of that remission is defined by reference to the Rules made under Section 25 of the Prison Act, 1952.
The Amendment will replace that definition by omitting all reference to the period of remission and, instead, will refer simply to a period equal to one-third of the term of imprisonment. That, incidentally, will have the practical advantage of making it unnecessary for a court in, say, Northern Ireland or in Scotland to refer to the English Prison Rules to find out what the maximum period of remission should be.
The effect would be exactly the same as we have in the Bill now so long as the Prison Rules were to remain the same, but, of course, if at some future date the Rules were altered so that instead of one-third remission it was a different proportion of the sentence, we would have been enacting this Measure in less certain manner than we will be by


accepting the Amendment which prescribes one-third of the term of imprisonment instead of reference to the Prison Rules. It is not easy to explain, but I hope that I have made it fairly clear.

Miss Bacon: I hope that the rest of the House is a little clearer on this matter than I am. I know that it is getting late and that the hon. and learned Gentleman is tired—and so are we—but perhaps he could explain whether it will mean a different period of remission. Will it be longer or shorter, or is it just that the words are different? I must admit that I did not follow the Under-Secretary in his explanation, and I am quite sure, judging from the look on the faces of many of his hon. Friends, that they did not follow it either.

Mr. Renton: As I say, under the Prison Rules as they are it will mean the same, because those Rules at present say one-third. If, however, at some future date the Rules were to be altered and the period was made different from one-third of the sentence, the effect would be different. As it is, we are enacting on the basis of the present Prison Rules, but making the basis permanent for the purpose of the Schedule.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 32, line 4, after "certified" to insert:
and, if the term of imprisonment which he was serving until his release is stated in the notice of supervision, shall be evidence of the length of that teem".
Paragraph 12 of the Third Schedule provides, among other things, that in any proceedings for an order of recall
… a certificate purporting to be signed by or on behalf of the Prison Commissioners and certifying … that a notice of supervision was given … in the terms specified in the certificate … shall be evidence of the matters so specified …
The Amendment provides that if the term of imprisonment which the person was serving until his release is stated in the notice of supervision, that shall be evidence of the length of the term of imprisonment.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In page 32, line 21, to leave out from first "Schedule" to end of line 22.—[Mr. Renton.]

12 m.

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 32, line 24, at the end to insert:
16. For the purposes of Part III of this Act, a person who has been sent back to prison under paragraph 5 or paragraph 10 of this Schedule, and has not been released again, shall be deemed to be serving part of his original sentence, whether or not the term of that sentence has in fact expired.
When a person under supervision has been recalled to prison by an order of the court, that order will be served in the country where it is made; but it may be desirable that the person should be transferred to another part of the United Kingdom, or the Channel Islands, or the Isle of Man. It is, however, doubtful whether the provisions as they stand are applicable to persons recalled while under supervision because those provisions are drafted in a way which refers to persons serving sentences of imprisonment. It is not clear that a person recalled is, in fact, a person serving a sentence of imprisonment, and the purpose of this amendment is to make clear that such a person is deemed to be serving part of his original sentence.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, in page 32, line 25, to leave out Part II and insert:

PART II APPLICATION TO SCOTLAND, NORTHERN IRELAND, CHANNEL ISLANDS AND THE ISLE OF MAN

Scotland

17. In relation to anything falling to be done in Scotland under Part I of this Schedule, any reference to a probation officer shall be omitted, and references to an officer of the Society shall be construed as including references to any other person authorised by the Society.

18. In relation to proceedings in Scotland, paragraph 5 of this Schedule shall have effect as if for the reference to a magistrates' court there were substituted a reference to the sheriff, and references in paragraphs 9 and 10 to the court and to a magistrates' court shall be construed accordingly; in paragraph 8 the words "under the said section one" shall be omitted; and the following shall be substituted for paragraphs 6 and 7:—
6. Proceedings for an order under paragraph 5 above shall be commenced by sworn information laid by or on behalf of the Prison Commissioners before a sheriff having jurisdiction in the area in which the supervising officer carries out his duties; and upon any such information the sheriff may issue a warrant for the arrest of the person under supervision or may, if he thinks fit, instead of issuing such a warrant in the first instance.


issue a citation requiring that person to appear before him at such time as may be specified in the citation.
7. If the sheriff before whom a person appears or is brought under the last foregoing paragraph is satisfied that that person has failed to comply with any of the requirements of his supervision, the sheriff may make an order under the said paragraph 5 accordingly".

19. If any proceedings in Scotland, a certificate of notice which, under paragraph 12 or paragraph 13 of this Schedule, is evidence of any matter shall be sufficient evidence of that matter.

20. Where an order is made by any court in Scotland under paragraph 5 or paragraph 10 of this Schedule sending back to prison a person under supervision, the court shall commit him to a prison in Scotland; but the Secretary of State may, without application in that behalf, make at any time an order under section twenty-four of this Act transferring him to a prison in England.

21. In relation to a person detained by virtue of an order under the said paragraph 5 or paragraph 10 in a prison in Scotland, paragraph 11 (and, if that person is released from such a prison under that paragraph, paragraph 2) of this Schedule shall have effect as if for references to the Prison Commissioners there were substituted references to the Secretary of State.

Northern Ireland

22. In relation to anything falling to be done in Northern Ireland under Part I of this Schedule, any reference to a probation officer shall be construed as a reference to a probation officer in Northern Ireland.

23. In relation to proceedings in Northern Ireland, paragraphs 5 to 10 of this Schedule shall have effect as if—

(a) for references to a magistrates' court there were substituted references to a court of summary jurisdiction;
(b) for references to the Magistrates' Courts Act, 1952 (except references to section one of that Act) there were substituted references to the Summary Jurisdiction Acts (Northern Ireland); and
(c) for references to the said section one there were substituted references to section eleven of the Petty Sessions (Ireland) Act, 1851.

24. Where an order is made by a court in Northern Ireland under paragraph 5 or paragraph 10 of this Schedule sending back to prison a person under supervision, the court shall commit him to a prison in Northern Ireland; but the Minister of Home Affairs may, without application in that behalf, make at any time an order under section twenty-four of this Act transferring him to a prison in England

25. In relation to a person detained by virtue of an order under the said paragraph 5 or paragraph 10 in a prison in Northern Ireland, paragraph 11 (and, if that person is released from such a prison under that paragraph, paragraph 2) of this Schedule shall have effect

as if for references to the Prison Commissioners there were substituted references to the Ministry of Home Affairs for Northern Ireland.

Channel Islands and Isle of Man

26. Her Majesty may by Order in Council make such provision as appears to Her to be proper for the purposes of or in connection with the application of Pan I of this Schedule to any of the Channel Islands or to the Isle of Man.

General

27. In relation to anything falling to be done outside England and Wales, any reference to the Society in Part I of this Schedule shall (subject to any Order in Council under paragraph 26 of this Schedule) be construed as a reference to the Society within the meaning of paragraph 14 of this Schedule or such other society as may be designated for the purpose by the Secretary of State; and different societies may be designated under this paragraph for different purposes of the said Part I, or for any purpose of that Part in its application to persons of different classes or in different circumstances.

28. The enactments authorising warrants of arrest for criminal offences issued in any country to which this Schedule extends to be executed in any other such country shall apply to any warrant issued for the purposes of proceedings under Part I of this Schedule as they apply to such warrants as aforesaid.

This section is much longer than that in the Bill at present. The House will recall that during the Committee stage my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General, as a result of representations made from both sides, introduced a procedure for recall of those former prisoners doing compulsory supervision, and the procedure which was put into Part 1 of the First Schedule is a procedure which invokes the jurisdiction of the magistrates' courts in order that anybody may be sent back to prison for breaking the requirements of the supervision order. It is necessary to dovetail that procedure with the circumstances which will sometimes arise, namely, that a person who to do compulsory supervision after serving a sentence of an English court may decide—as he is free to do—to live in some other part of the United Kingdom or in the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man.

This new Part 11 of this Schedule contains what I can best describe as dovetailing arrangements. They provide how the supervision order shall be carried out in other parts of the United Kingdom, or the Channel Islands, or the Isle of Man, and it will be seen that we


have set out what will happen in Scotland. The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland is here to deal with any matter which may arise on that point. Then, we have set out what will happen in Northern Ireland, where the position is relatively simple, because Northern Ireland also has a probation service and magistrates' courts and will be able to operate this procedure for recall without trouble.

In the case of the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, we shall have to proceed in the way in which we normally proceed when any question arises of legislative provisions being needed which are within the competence of the Governments of either of those places. In those circumstances, Her Majesty legislates by Order in Council. Therefore, we say in the Amendment that
Her Majesty may by Order in Council make such provision as appears to Her to be proper for the purposes of or in connection with the application of Part I of this Schedule to any of the Channel Islands or to the Isle of Man.

Then follow some general provisions which apply to any of those parts of the United Kingdom and which are of a purely formal character.

These provisions are necessary. They are somewhat formal. No hon. Member need feel that they are likely to give rise to any difficulty of substance or of practice. They are the kind of provisions which we need to include whenever we are attempting, while legislating in England or Wales, to ensure that intentions are not frustrated merely because somebody goes outside the jurisdiction of the courts of England and Wales and into the jurisdiction of the courts of another part of the United Kingdom.

Mr. Steele: We are indebted to the Under-Secretary of State for his explanation. I followed the Committee stage of the Bill, but a different provision is now in the Bill because of a principle which was altered in Committee. It is true that in the original Bill the Government had decided on the recall procedure, but because of the difference of view in the Committee, which was not confined to either side, the Government decided to alter the recall procedure and that if anyone who was under compulsory after-

care had to be brought back, it should be done through the courts.
I agree that this long Amendment is essential. If someone who is convicted in England and who is under compulsory after-care goes to Scotland and commits a breach of the regulations governing after-care, it is necessary to have a provision of this kind to enable the Scottish courts to deal with the matter without having the person brought back to England. All that I understand.
I should not have worried too much about the matter, because the former terms of Part II of the Schedule fully met my point concerning the question of who should do the after-care supervision. The Under-Secretary has said that Part II sets out how the supervision would be carried out. May I first of all draw his attention to that part which is now being taken away? Paragraph 18 of Part II of the Schedule—Supplementary Provisions—states:
Any reference in this Schedule to a probation officer shall include a reference to a probation officer in any part of the United Kingdom…
That is quite clear and concise, and there can be no doubt that if the After Care Council so desires the job of supervision will be undertaken by a probation officer.
It is true, of course, that in England the After Care Council does, in fact, act as a liaison between the prisons and the field work done by the probation officers, apart from some after-care work which the After Care Council itself undertakes in London. But, generally speaking, what happens is that the After Care Council in England will have the information given to it when a prisoner is released and will contact the probation officer who is nearest to that individual's home and arrange for the probation officer to undertake the necessary supervision.
That is the situation in England, and, of course, the Bill makes no alteration to that matter. If, of course, the person is released from prison in England and goes home to Scotland then the After Care Council in England will take the necessary steps to ensure that a probation officer in Scotland undertakes his supervision and deals directly with the After Care Council in England. That, too, is satisfactory. But if the hon. Gentleman will look at Part II of the proposed new


Schedule he will see that paragraph 17 says:
In relation to anything falling to be done in Scotland under Part I of this Schedule, any reference to a probation officer shall be omitted …
whereas under the Northern Ireland provision paragraph 22 says:
… any reference to a probation officer shall be construed as a reference to a probation officer in Northern Ireland.
I think that we are entitled to some explanation because Part II refers to a probation officer whereas if we look at paragraph 2 of Part I we see it stated in brackets:
(being an officer of the Society or a probation officer)".
That is the person who will be exercising the supervision. This new Part II says that the probation officer will be the supervising officer in England, Northern Ireland and Wales, but that the probation officer will not be the supervising officer in Scotland.
The reason why I raise this matter is because the whole question of after care and the organisation which will deal with after care is at the moment being considered, and it seems to me to be very odd indeed that in this Schedule dealing with Scotland the probation officer should be deliberately omitted from those who might undertake the supervision. Of course, we have an After Care Council in Scotland as well, but what is happening there is that the After Care Council itself is building up a staff and hoping to do the field work. This, I think, is contrary to what is happening in England. It is contrary to the experience in England in so far as too many people are entering into one home.
12.15 a.m.
It is my experience that this problem usually arises as a family problem. One boy in the family, who has gone through an approved school or to Borstal, may be on after-care. In Scotland under these provisions the child welfare officer from the local authority may be going into a home, as well as the welfare officer from the approved school, the probation officer to deal with a boy on probation and an officer of the After Care council for an older boy who has come out of prison.
This is nonsense. We are entitled to an explanation why it has been done. It

may be that the Joint Under-Secretary of State does not possess the information to enable him to give full details, but I want an assurance that the bodies which are discussing the whole question of supervision and aftercare will not be stultified in their examination of it and in any recommendation which they make by this provision in the English Bill. I hope that its inclusion in the English Bill will not mean that when we deal with a Scottish Bill it is accepted as part of the procedure and that the probation officer will be ruled out from acting as a supervisory officer. I should like the Joint Under-Secretary to answer those points.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. T. G. D. Galbraith): I will try to help the hon. Member for Dunbartonshire, West (Mr. Steele). The question is at present under consideration by the Scottish Advisory Council on the Treatment of Offenders, and it is not possible at this stage to predict what system the Advisory Council will recommend should be adopted. Whatever system it recommends could be introduced in a future Scottish Bill even if it were different from the system in this Bill. If it is desired in future in Scotland to make use of probation officers, as the hon. Member suggests, it could be authorised by the society.
I hope that this explanation indicates to the hon. Member that there is no intention of binding future Scottish legislation by the provisions of the Bill. I hope that that sets the hon. Member's doubts at rest.

Mr. Thomas Fraser: I think hon. Members in all parts of the House recognise that that reply is hopelessly inadequate. Compulsory aftercare if a new system. I have been doing my best to follow Part I of this Schedule and, like my hon. Friend the Member for Dunbartonshire, West (Mr. Steele), I wonder why the probation officer is regarded as a suitable person to supervise the young person who is in after-care in England, Wales and Northern Ireland but in Scotland the probation officer is considered by the Ministers to be quite unsuitable for this purpose.
The Joint Under-Secretary of State said that the whole question was being looked at by the Advisory Council for the Treatment of Offenders in Scotland, and he added, "After we get their


recommendation we shall see what we shall do in some future legislation for Scotland." Could not we consider what we should do in Scotland, after having received the advice of the Advisory Council, notwithstanding the fact that we had given the probation officers in Scotland exactly the same place under the Bill as that given to probation officers in other parts of the United Kingdom?
After all, as my hon. Friend said, in Part II as it is, unamended, in the Bill the words that are proposed to be taken out keep the probation officers in Scotland in exactly the same position as probation officers in the rest of the United Kingdom. When the original Part II was drafted, the Joint Under-Secretary knew full well that the Scottish Advisory Council on the Treatment of Offenders was at that time also considering the whole question.
Is this not offensive to the probation officers in Scotland, who have for long felt that the Secretary of State was not willing to allocate to them the kind of duties that were allocated by Ministers in other parts of the United Kingdom? This is the grouse. The probation officers in Scotland have not hitherto had the necessary status, and if the House passes the Amendment in its present form there will be further evidence of Parliament having less confidence in the proficiency of probation officers in Scotland than it has in probation officers in other parts of the United Kingdom. There can be no reason for that.
This must have come in as an afterthought. When the Bill was first introduced and when it was going through Committee, it was considered, apparently, that probation officers in Scotland were as fitted as probation officers in other parts of the United Kingdom to undertake this supervising work, but suddenly there has been a change and we have got this Amendment on Report. There is a change because the new Part II says that a probation officer in Scotland shall not be a supervising officer.
It is no answer to say that an examination is being made of the treatment of offenders by an advisory body in Scotland and that at some time it may advise us on the rôle of probation officers. As my hon. Friend has said, it is known

that the After Care Council would like to undertake this work itself using its officers for it, and it is interesting to note that the new paragraph 17 says:
In relation to anything falling to be done in Scotland under Part I of this Schedule, any reference to a probation officer shall be omitted, and references to an officer of the Society shall be construed as including references to any other person authorised by the Society.
So Her Majesty's Ministers consider that a probation officer is unsuited to do this supervising work. It says that the officer who shall do the supervising may be any person who will be authorised by the society—the After Care Council—to undertake the work. If there is an explanation for that, the Joint Under-Secretary might have given it rather than the hopelessly inadequate one that he gave.
I have another question about the part of the Amendment which relates to Scotland. Paragraph 20 says:
Where an order is made by any court in Scotland under paragraph 5 or paragraph 10 of this Schedule sending back to prison a person under supervision, the court shall commit him to a prison in Scotland; but the Secretary of State may, without application in that behalf, make at any time an order under section twenty-four of this Act transferring him to a prison in England.
There might be a very good reason for the Secretary of State to make such an order without application being made to him, but I think that, generally speaking, it would be desirable for him to make it only on application.
It may well be that the young person committed to prison and later made the subject of compulsory after-care is domiciled normally in Scotland but happened to commit his offence in England and, therefore, went to an English prison, returning to his home in Scotland upon release. In those circumstances it would be wrong if the Secretary of State made an order sending him back to an English prison because the Scottish court in the first place had power only to commit him, for a breach of supervision, to an English prison.
Again, the young person might normally be domiciled in England, and then, while he is in prison or when he has become subject to compulsory after-care, his family moves to Scotland. It would appear, however, that the Secretary of State, without any application being


made to him, could at any time send that person back to prison in England. It seems wrong, and if there is a reason for this provision we shall be delighted to hear it.

Mr. Renton: If the young man is domiciled in Scotland he will not be sent back to England even though he had originally been sentenced there and had returned to Scotland while under supervision. If, on the other hand, he is domiciled in England, then it might well be considered in most cases, and certainly in many, that he should be returned to England if there is a recall to prison. I hope the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) thinks that reasonable.
The hon. Member dealt with his other point at great length, but I hope I shall be able to deal with it quite shortly. I can re-assure him completely. I do not think he realises that under existing law there are reciprocal provisions between England and Wales and Scotland for the supervision of people who are on licence from Borstal or from a sentence of corrective training or preventive detention. At the moment, the recall of an English prisoner is by the Prison Commissioners to a prison in England. We are abandoning the idea of recall by the Commissioners without any intervention by the courts, and it is in the light of the fact that we are introducing the safeguard of intervention by the courts that we have to regard the provisions of the Third Schedule.
The hon. Member asked about the position of probation officers and is, quite naturally, anxious that probation officers shall play their part in supervision and, indeed, in any legal proceedings which may be involved. Here, again, one needs to bear in mind the present as well as the future position. In England, the supervising officer under the after-care arrangements in the Bill will be either a officer of the Central After-Care Association, or a probation officer. That is secured by paragraphs 2 and 3 read in conjunction with paragraph 14 of the Schedule. In Scotland, the equivalent duties are at present undertaken by officers of the After Care Council and not by probation officers.

12.30 a.m.

Mr. Steele: Is the hon. and learned Gentleman certain that he has his facts right? My understanding of the situation is that if the After-Care Association in England is responsible for someone living in Scotland, it contacts a probation officer in Scotland who acts as a supervisory officer, and that in general that is not done through the Scottish After Care Council. It is my fear that the system will be altered and that the English After-Care Association will not use a probation officer.

Mr. Renton: I was going on to explain, and that intervention will add emphasis to my explanation, that both the Central After-Care Association in England and the After Care Council in Scotland use probation officers as after care agents in many but not all cases. That is the present position.
It is true that paragraph 17 in the Amendment says:
In relation to anything falling to be done in Scotland … any reference to a probation officer shall be omitted, and references to an officer of the Society shall be construed as including references to any other person authorised by the Society.
For the definition of the Society we have to turn to paragraph 27 of the Schedule. What is to be done about after-care agents in Scotland is now being considered by the Scottish Advisory Council on the Treatment of Offenders. As my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland said, we cannot predict what the Advisory Council will recommend, but I can repeat what he said—that if in future it is desired to use probation officers, that can be authorised in future as it has been in the past by the After Care Council, subject to what the Advisory Council recommends. That being the position, it is perhaps unfortunate that we have to express it this way in the legislation, but the Society will be the responsible body in Scotland instead of probation officers being made directly responsible.
Incidentally, in England also, even though probation officers will in many cases and perhaps in most cases be used, it is the After-Care Association which is also made responsible for the supervision arrangements under Part III.

Mr. Steele: Mr. Steele indicated dissent.

Mr. Renton: The hon. Gentleman shakes his head, but he cannot get away from the words of the Third Schedule.

Mr. Steele: I am following what the hon. and learned Gentleman is saying, but why make this difference between Scotland, Northern Ireland, England and Wales? That is the point. I suspect that it has been decided to cut out probation officers in Scotland. There is a long history behind this, but perhaps the hon. and learned Gentleman is not aware of that. If the whole system of after-care is being considered in Scotland, it is also being considered in England and Wales, and surely the form of words which is there for Northern Ireland, England and Wales is good enough to safeguard the position in Scotland? If a change is to take place because of the recommendations of a committee, the use of the words in the Bill, without being altered, would not alter that position.

Mr. Renton: I believe that I have a right to speak twice, but if I wish to speak a third time I think that I must have the leave of the House to do so, and I hope that I may have that to say this to the hon. Gentleman. I am sorry he does not accept what both my hon. Friend and I have said, that when the Bill refers to the society, bearing in mind the powers and duties of after-care societies, it enables probation officers to be employed. That surely is the position, and I cannot add to or take away from it. Nevertheless, as the hon. Gentleman still seems to have doubts about it I will consider whether these words are the most apt words which need to be used, and if they are not they will be corrected in another place.

Amendment agreed to.

Fourth Schedule.—(MINOR AND CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS.)

Amendments made: In page 34, line 6, column 2, at end insert:
In section seventy-two, in subsection (4), for the words "two months" there shall be substituted the words "six months", and for the words "twenty pounds" there shall be substituted the words "one hundred pounds".
In section seventy-eight, in subsection (4), for the words "two months" there shall be substituted the words "six months", and for the words "twenty pounds" there shall be substituted the words "one hundred pounds

In page 34, line 10, column 2 at end insert:
and in subsection (4), for the words 'two months' there shall be substituted the words 'six months', and for the words 'twenty pounds' there shall be substituted the words 'one hundred pounds'".—[Mr. Renton.]

Fifth Schedule.—(ENACTMENTS REPEALED.)

Amendment made: In page 40, line 18, column 3 [Schedule 5], at end insert:
In section nineteen, in subsection (1), the words "not exceeding twelve in the aggregate".—[Mr. Renton.]

12.40 a.m.

Mr. Renton: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I should like to pay tribute to the spirit in which hon. Members on both sides have approached the examination of the Bill at all its stages, and to express the appreciation of my right hon. Friend and of myself for the valuable contributions which have been made to the Bill by the many criticisms and constructive suggestions we have received.
May I mention, without being presumptuous, the part played by the hon. Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon)? Not only does she speak with a considerable knowledge of approved schools, but she has shown tremendous diligence and application in grasping the complicated provisions of the Bill. We are grateful to her for her help. The hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) has spoken, with his great experience as a juvenile court magistrate, and his advice has been most valuable, and the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede), speaking with all the authority of a former Home Secretary and a justice of the peace, has often shed kindly light upon us. My hon. Friend the Member fox Ashford (Mr. Deedes) has also made some valuable contributions, in the light of his considerable experience.
Many useful Amendments have been made on points of detail, both in Committee and on Report, but it is fair to say that the Bill preserves the broad principles which it contained when it was first introduced by my right hon. Friend in November. Very shortly, it covers a wide field, but set in the forefront, in the words used by my right hon. Friend


in the Second Reading debate, is the fact that it
is designed to make more effective and appropriate measures of detention and punishment for young offenders."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1960; Vol. 630, c. 562.]
Some of these measures may be more severe and more restrictive than existing measures; few are likely to turn out to be less severe. It is not the intention of the Bill to make the path of young offenders any easier, and there is nothing in it to deprive courts of the power to inflict severe punishment where severe punishment is required.
The Bill will prohibit the imprisonment of young persons under the age of 16, restrict the imprisonment of those under 21, and reduce the term of a borstal sentence from three to two years. Those alone are very important changes in our criminal law. On the other hand, the minimum age for a borstal sentence is lowered from 16 to 15, and the regime of borstal training will, we hope, be more effective than in the past. There will be a wider use of detention centres and, under Clause 13, compulsory aftercare for those who have served in such centres. The maximum fines which children and young persons, and their parents, can be ordered to pay are increased, and the provisions of the law with regard to attendance centres are being strengthened.
Finally, I must call attention to the important provisions in Clause 20 and the Third Schedule, which provide for the extension of compulsory after-care for additional categories of people sentenced to imprisonment and for their supervision on release, and for their recall by order of a magistrates' court where they fail to comply with the requirements of supervision. It may be some time before these provisions can be brought fully into effect, but they are potentially of great reformative value in dealing with the everlasting problem of the recidivist. It is obvious that the implementation of the Bill depends upon the building of still more detention centres, approved schools, remand centres and prisons but, as my right hon. Friend pointed out, we have a large building programme and we are pressing on with it.
I am confident that the Bill marks a real advance and provides methods

flexible enough to enable courts to deal in an approprite way with the great number of offenders who are unfortunately brought before them. The courts should now be able to deal with them in a way which will not only achieve the aim of the protection of society but also the prevention of crime and the reformation of the offender. I believe that it will strengthen the hands of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, the courts, and all those who deal with this difficult matter in such a devoted way in the various establishments where young people have to be treated.
I ask the House to give the Bill a Third Reading.

12.45 a.m.

Miss Alice Bacon: I was going to begin by saying that I was sorry that we were having to take the Third Reading at such an hour as this. The concluding sentence of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Joint Under-Secretary showed that he also was beginning to feel a little tired after this very long sitting.
The choice before us was either to have the Third Reading at a late hour tonight or at a late hour tomorrow night. I am very sorry that we have only this choice before us, because it means that some of my hon. Friends who, I know, would like to have taken part in this debate, are unable to be with us. Some of those hon. Friends not only sat through every moment of the Committee stage, but have taken their duties very seriously indeed and visited many of the institutions with which we have been dealing in discussion of this Bill.
I wish to thank the hon. and learned Gentleman for what he said about some of us on this side of the House. I have been under the disadvantage of being neither a lawyer nor a magistrate and I have not had the experience that that would give to deal with the Bill, although on occasion it might be an advantage in considering these matters not to be a lawyer but a layman, or should I say, a laywoman. I wish to thank the hon. and learned Gentleman and the Attorney-General for the way in which they gave us detailed explanations on points raised in Committee. We did not always agree with them and sometimes we thought that the explanations were not quite adequate, but I am sure that


they did everything they could to put the details of the Bill before us.
I said on Second Reading that this was a rather disappointing Bill. In some ways it still is. There are certain provisions in the Bill which we welcome, but nevertheless, I feel that an opportunity has been missed to give us a much more far-reaching Measure. Although it has many other things in it, the main aim of the Bill is eventually to keep young people under the age of 21 out of prison. That is to be commended, but we must not forget that one of the aims of the 1948 Criminal Justice Act was also to keep young people under 21 out of prison, yet, twelve years afterwards, we have not reached that target.
One of the disappointing things in this Bill is in Clause 1. We have talked about that at some length tonight, but I still feel that the proposal to reduce the borstal age from 16 to 15 without the provision we sought to put in to ensure that young people of 15 would not be spending time on remand in prison, is to be regretted. We are very pleased to hear that there are to be more detention centres. We shall look at the speed with which they are built and the way in which they develop. Detention centres are comparatively new. They are an innovation and we shall be watching their development because in this Bill great store is set by them.
I regret very much indeed the inclusion of Clauses 14 to 19. Those Clauses deal with approved schools. This is the only part of the Bill which deals with matters which come under the jurisdiction of the Children's Department rather than the Prison Commission. Until now approved schools have never been regarded as part of a Criminal Justice Act, but as part of a Children and Young Persons Act. It might have been better to have left Clauses 14 to 19 out of the Bill altogether and to have given much more consideration to the whole question of approved schools in order to include them in some more far-reaching proposals in the further Bill dealing with children and young persons which we have been promised.
I do not much like the method of the temporary removal from the approved school. However, when I mentioned this earlier tonight I thought that the

Home Secretary nodded his assent to my suggestion that he might look at the whole question again in order to see whether something more far-reaching could be done in the further Bill that is contemplated.
The right hon. Gentleman is taking powers in this Measure to give directions to the managers of approved schools and, in some ways, changing the constitution of the managements. We approve of that although, as I say, we would have preferred something more far-reaching. We very much welcome the provision about attendance centres because, as I have already said, I believe that residential institutions, particularly for young people—although it is true also of adults—create more problems than they solve. Anything that can be done to keep young people in their own homes, even if they have to undergo some kind of training, is to be welcomed.
I welcome, too, what the Home Secretary has said about the building of more remand centres. These are very important, indeed. They are not just places to which people can be sent on remand, but places where they will be observed in order to enable magistrates and others to decide what is the best course to take.
We have had a fairly lengthy discussion this evening on the Prison Commission and the proposal to bring the Commission more closely in touch with the Home Office. One thing I very much welcomed in the right hon. Gentleman's speech on the subject—although I am not sure that it could not have been done without interfering with the Prison Commissioners—was his statement that it was his intention to co-ordinate the approved school system, the borstal system and the detention centres.
There is at present a sort of artificial distinction between the approved schools and the borstals, and we were not able on Report to discuss some of the anomalies now existing in the provisions for approved schools and those for borstals. It is usually recognised that a borstal sentence is more serious and severe than is a sentence to an approved school. The changes the Bill will make to the borstals will mean that anyone sent there will be there for a shorter


period than if sent to an approved school. The Bill reduces the borstal period from three years to two, but the approved-school period remains at three years. As we pointed out in Committee, it might be the desire and aim of someone in an approved school so to misbehave himself as to get sent to borstal and get out again more quickly.
I am very sorry that an Amendment by which we sought to rectify that position was not called, but I certainly welcome what the right hon. Gentleman said about co-ordinating the approved school, the borstals and the detention centres. There is at present a sort of artificial division between them. When one visits approved schools—particularly the closed schools—one sees very little difference between them and the borstals—particularly the open borstals—and anything that is done to alter that situation will toe welcome.
The Bill contains important after-care provisions. I need not here stress the very great importance of after-care. An adequate system means saving an ex-prisoner from going back into prison. I believe that in this country, after-care is made much more difficult by the very nature of our prison system. I had not been into many prisons until about eighteen months ago, but since then I have visited a number, and all hon. Members get letters from prisoners.
The prisons which we have, with their artificial and enclosed atmosphere, make it much more difficult for the average prisoner to resume life in the outside world. I believe that what is needed very much is a more realistic attitude towards work for prisoners in prison: but our prisons are so constructed that it is well nigh impossible for the prisoner to undertake the kind of work which corresponds to that which he would do outside the prison. If we can get away from the one building type of prison—the grim building constructed in the last century—to an open type camp where there are adequate workshops and small factories it will be all for the good. They should be places where prisoners can work, not only for themselves, but also to help towards their own upkeep and, perhaps, in time to help to compensate for the crimes they have committed. That would be a very great advance.
The 1948 Criminal Justice Act made many provisions which have not been carried into effect even today, and that serves to show that it is not what an Act of Parliament lays down that is important but the speed with which it is implemented, the speed with which its terms are carried out. If what I have said is true of the 1948 Act, it can be equally true of this Bill after it has become law. In other words, it is not what is in the Bill which is all-important, but the speed with which we get on with providing the detention centres, the remand centres, and the other things.
We should delude ourselves if we thought tonight that thinking of the young offender was all that was needed to solve all our trouble. The main aim is to keep such a person out of trouble, and that is something for which much more is needed. We on this side support the Bill so far as it goes. We hoped that it would go further, but we look now to the Home Secretary to see that the provisions of the Bill are carried out with the utmost speed and energy. If that is done, the Bill will at least be a step forward.

12.59 a.m.

Commander Anthony Courtney: I have listened to this debate with close attention, and I spent many hours in Committee upstairs. I hope even at this hour, that I may be allowed to make two points which I consider to be of substance. First, I want to deal with the provisions in the Bill for attendance centres. We discussed that matter in Committee—perhaps not so fully or deeply as we might have wished—but we did not at that time have available the detailed report of the Cambridge Institute of Criminology, nor has it since become available.
That report made a check on, I think, nine of the forty attendance centres which exist in this country at present. If we had had that opportunity I think that we might have paid more attention on the Floor of the House tonight to this particular aspect of the Bill. It is worthy of note that the statistics show that 39 per cent. of boys going through these centres suffer from lack of parental control and discipline. We all know that that is one of the basic causes of juvenile delinquency. It is perhaps, of a little more concern that no less than 90 per cent. of the boys who went through


these attendance centres had received reports of conduct at school of either "Good" or "Fair". I hope that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, who, undoubtedly, has studied the report in its draft form, will bring this important matter to the notice of his right hon. Friend the Minister of Education.
I am concerned in reading that 18 per cent. of these boys incur summary punishment at attendance centres for breaches of discipline. I associate that with the fact that the greatest sanction which can be brought to bear on these boys is to increase the number of attendances by reducing the ordinary two-hour period to one hour, therefore doubling the number of Saturday afternoons on which they have to attend.
I am not sure whether we should be satisfied with the 62 per cent. success rate set out in the Cambridge report. We should ask ourselves whether the deterrent effects of attendance centres on young people, with entry now to be reduced to the age of 10, and the disciplinary powers available to officers in charge of attendance centres, are adequate.
I believe it to be true that the great majority of these centres are administered by the police under the Home Office. I should like to see a growing relationship between the local uniformed police officers and the young people in their charge in attendance centres in order, perhaps, to return to these uniformed police officers some of the respect which, we know, they have lost among young people over recent years.
My second point concerns detention centres. I maintain that the efficacy of these centres, even on the limited experience of the four which have been available for some years, as a deterrent, is as yet unproved. They have demonstrably shown no ability to counter the increase in juvenile crime with which, I presume, it is the main object of the Bill to compete. The figure of 58 per cent. success rate in detention centres is scarcely a proof of the efficacy of these centres as a deterrent to inmates from being sentenced to further periods of punishment.
When speaking yesterday, my right hon. Friend referred to rumours that the regime in detention centres has weakened. I have done some investigations

into this and I believe that there has been some erosion of that "strictest possible regime" referred to yesterday by my right hon. Friend, who in his further remarks quoted assurances from the Prison Commissioners, who have been mentioned in another context, that all is in fact well.
I should like to ask my right hon. Friend two questions, one of which is specific and germane to this matter. Is it a fact that at the Goudhurst senior detention centre the practice of the inmates moving at the double between their various exercises and classes was in force for the first five—perhaps six—years of the operation of that institution, and is it a further fact that that has now been abolished? I would ask my right hon. Friend at the same time whether he considers that that is not in itself one weakening of the detention centre regime to which he referred yesterday.
My second question is whether my right hon. Friend considers that in a penal institution whose main object is deterrence, where the inmates are smart in uniform, the standards of discipline to which he and we all aspire are best maintained by a disciplinary staff in plain clothes and, from my own observation, somewhat variegated plain clothes at that. I consider, having visited Goudhurst—and I said this in a note which I sent to my right hon. Friend—that the discipline at that institution is what I as a retired naval officer would describe as sloppy. I believe, furthermore, from conversations with the disciplinary staff that the erosion to which I previously referred has perhaps extended slightly to the morale of the disciplinary staff themselves.
I would refer my right hon. Friend to a letter in The Times today which refers to a similar phenomenon in prisons. It may be said that there is no basis of comparison for a statement such as I have just made. I do not believe that that is true. There is a basis of comparison. At Portsmouth there are naval detention quarters which have been in continuous operation for over fifty years and which have evolved continuously as the most modern reformative—

Mr. Bruce Millan: On a point of order. Is the hon. and gallant Gentleman really making a Third Reading speech, Mr. Deputy-Speaker?


Is he not raising details which are quite out of order on Third Reading? They are not in the Bill.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Sir William Anstruther-Gray): I appreciate the point of order which has been raised. I myself was beginning to think that the hon. and gallant Member was going a little outside the proper scope of a Third Reading speech. Perhaps he will confine himself closely to what is in the Bill.

Commander Courtney: I beg your pardon, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and I apologise to the House for, perhaps, slightly deviating from the point, but, if I may say this in conclusion, I believe that the Bill contains many admirable provisions. I think that we must consider all these written provisions in the context of the failure mentioned by the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) to compete with the rising scale of juvenile crime. None of these written provisions will be effective until properly supervised by my right hon. Friend, and I ask him to take into consideration the points I have mentioned and to make sure that this admirable Measure is properly administered in practice.

1.8 a.m.

Mr. Alan Fitch: I am sure that you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and hon. and right hon. Members will appreciate the quality of brevity at this late hour. I intend to be very brief. I believe that the Bill is a step in the right direction, because it is an attempt to deal in a constructive manner with juvenile crime. It contains experiments, and I believe that we must be prepared to experiment with different methods of dealing with crime.
The detention centre is one experiment, but, on the other hand, if we find that certain experiments are proving to be failures we must have the courage to scrap them. I think that the Government have shown commendable common sense in dealing with the problem of crime at the right end, that is, with the young offender, because if we can reduce crime there I believe that our battle if perhaps not won is at least well on the way to being won.
Of course, all of us who have taken part in the debates on the various stages

of the Bill have our own ideas as to which part of the Bill is most important. To me, one of the most important aspects of the Bill is the provision contained in Clause 20 and in the Third Schedule, that is, the compulsory supervision or after-care. I believe that this has been the most neglected part of our penal system. At present, 90 per cent. of the people who are discharged from our prisons are outside the scope of compulsory supervision. They can receive voluntary help but, however good it is, I do not believe that voluntary help will solve the problem.
I hope that this is the first of many efforts which the Government will make with a view eventually to including all prisoners within the scope of compulsory supervision. As my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South-East (Miss Bacon) said, this is a very important part of penal reform. A fair percentage of those who go to prison are there not because they are wicked but because they are weak, unstable and inadequate. In other words, they cannot cope with the problems, difficulties and temptations with which ordinary people manage to cope. Any agency which helps them to find a job and to readjust themselves in their domestic and social lives—helps them when they need it most—is doing essential work.
But this is still in its experimental stage. Can the Home Secretary give us any idea whether compulsory supervision has proved to be successful? I hope that it has, for it is an experiment worth undertaking. I do not want to go outside the scope of the Bill but I hope that it will be the forerunner of a more comprehensive after-care scheme along the lines advocated by the Pakenham-Thompson Committee.
Another aspect of the Bill which appeals to me is a Clause which we discussed yesterday which raised the penalties for those who assist in escapes from prison. The Joint Under-Secretary of State gave some startling figures. I have heard from people in authority that this sort of thing takes place on a large scale and has become almost a business; a gang leader is sometimes prepared to pay a large sum of money for the escape of a former member of his gang whom he regards as a key man. I heard of a case in which an expert


safe breaker was in prison and it was estimated that his ex-leader had spent up to £1,000 in trying to facilitate his escape. This is an important matter, and we must stamp on it.
I share the doubts expressed by my hon. Friend the member for Leeds, South-East about Clauses 14 to 19. The prison welfare officer is doing a good job but—using the word in its best sense—there is room for tightening up. The situation in after-care in approved schools seems to be a little haphazard and we need a central after-care agency. I am also concerned about the composition of the managers of approved schools. Probably there should be more control over their selection.
We are engaged in a very difficult task. Before the war many of us held the view that crime was the result of poverty. We have been proved wrong, because crime is even more prevalent in an affluent society. I believe—we must be honest—that the Home Secretary and his team have done a good job, but I hope they will not rest there. I hope that this is the beginning of other constructive Measures.
I do not want to be presumptuous, but I should like to thank the Joint Under-Secretary. Today is the first time for a long while than I have seen him smile. Throughout the proceedings in Committee he has shown patience and tolerance towards some of us who may at times have aggravated him. Membership of the Standing Committee has been an experience which I have enjoyed. I am sure that I have gained in many ways from it.

1.16 a.m.

Mr. William Roots: I welcome the provisions of Clause 20, which deals with after-care. It is the first effective and positive step that we have had, and I do not believe it is possible to exaggerate its importance. Even leaving aside the philanthropic aspect, on a purely practical basis there is the waste of time and money in imprisoning people without assisting them to become useful members of society or supervising them in the changeover period. The need for such assistance must be obvious.
The Clause also shows the need for a realignment of the existing services; in other words, recognition that, while there

is an official task which is commenced in the Clause, there is a very real job for the existing voluntary societies. I am sure that my right hon. Friend will recognise that it is not a question simply of criticism of them or of abandoning their efforts, because Lord Pakenham's Committee demonstrated that there is a very real part for the voluntary societies to play just as there is an important part for the officials. I hope that my right hon. Friend will be able to indicate that he will examine the realignment and in that way show that this is a first step in the reorganisation of a most important system.

1.19 a.m.

Mr. Deedes: I support what my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington, South (Mr. Roots) has said. I have always understood that there was a rôle for the Government in respect of Clause 20 and a rôle for the voluntary organisation. I hope and believe that that scope is unchanged by the provisions of the Bill. There has been some argument about the letter of the law here. I am not sure that we have done justice to the spirit of the proposal, which the Joint Under-Secretary has described as one of potentially great reformative value.
I should like an assurance from my right hon. Friend that the scope for voluntary work is undiminished and no less welcome as a result of the provisions of Clause 20 and the Schedule. While I accept what my hon. Friend says about the need for relating the work of the two sides, Government and voluntary organisations, there is a great deal of imaginative and spontaneous work going on, such as by the Oxford Borstal Group, what was Lord Pakenham's group, which I am not sure is very easily given by any official committee. I hope that we may have some word from my right hon. Friend about the continued rôle of the voluntary societies, which is probably enhanced rather than diminished by the Third Schedule.

1.20 a.m.

Mr. MacColl: I should like to join in the expressions of appreciation of the way in which these proceedings have, at some stages at any rate, been conducted. I do not pretend to agree with everything done by the Government, or with their inflexibility in dealing with some


of our proposals, but I am certain that they have been anxious to do what they could to meet what they regarded as reasonable criticisms. I complain only that their ideas and mine about what is reasonable are rather different.
I also express appreciation to my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South East (Miss Bacon), under whose firm and vigorous direction I have been carrying out somewhat subsidiary duties as her lieutenant. The Standing Committee owes much to her leadership and direction in examining the Bill.
This is a Bill which everyone wants, and there has been no desire unnecessarily to protract its proceedings. If there has been any such desire it has not been on this side of the House. But it is a shocking commentary on the workings of our Parliamentary system that, despite that, we are finally disposing of the Bill, which is vital to the lives of young people, at this time in the morning. It is shameful that our Parliamentary proceedings are such that a matter such as this, where there is no question of parties being at each other's throats but instead a genuine desire to get to grips with the complicated details of this subject, should have to be dealt with in these conditions and at this length of sitting.
My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South-East, has just remarked to me that in a few moments we will have been firmly rooted to these benches, with hardly a break, for ten hours. If physical discomfort were a deterrent, I am certain that very few of us would be stupid enough to repeat the offence. There must be some other deep, psychological drive which leads people to remain in such a ridiculous position of physical discomfort in such circumstances. I do not think that it makes for good legislation to do it, however.
The Bill has a main object and what is, perhaps, a subsidiary object. The main object is that of keeping young offenders out of prison, and it must be achieved both by satisfying public opinion that it can be done and by the Home Secretary's own feelings of what is required. In order to obtain that objective, he has been prepared to make what I regard as not progressive moves but as concessions to the rough and tough school of penal treatment. The

other object has been to prevent the re-introduction of flogging, and that, again, is something on which concessions have been made in order to try to draw the teeth of what I regard as the rather fanatical proponents of flogging.
The main defect of the Bill concerns the approved schools. The right hon. Gentleman has not really had any deep consideration of the problem of the future organisation of these schools. The Carlton Inquiry shook him and his Department very violently, and led to what I regard in some ways as panic action to deal with a special case. There has not been any clear and constructive attempt to think out the part which should be played by approved schools in our system, and that is one of the Bill's greatest weaknesses.
By and large, the things I like in the Bill are those which the hon. and gallant Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney) dislikes, and the things he likes are those which I dislike. It is a pity, but in the face of the present rate of delinquency it is understandable, that there should be this obsession with punishment rather than with constructive treatment. Such an attitude is not a step forward.
My view about punishment and discipline and so on is that they are useful to a certain extent, but they are superficial and do not get down to the roots of the problem. To take that line is to play with the problem. The problems of delinquency are much more deeply rooted and we know very little about them and how to tackle them. The problems of the mentally disturbed and maladjusted young offender are not tackled by putting him in a uniform and treating him with naval discipline. That might not do much harm to some of them, but it will not do much good. If we believe that it will, we delude ourselves. Of that I am sure.
During the discussion of the Bill there has been a certain amount of rather coy elusiveness about detention centres, their regime and their variety. The concept of the detention centre has very much changed compared with when the idea was first conceived in 1948. It has now become an all-purpose institution which is to take the place of prison for more or less all young offenders who commit serious offences. That is not what it was originally. Originally,


it was designed to deal with a certain type of offender who required rather brisk and breezy treatment.
I am concerned not so much with whether there is to be an adequate geographical covering of the country with detention centres, but with whether there will be enough of enough different types to deal with the wide variety of problems which offenders present. I am worried that, although there may appear to be enough detention centres, there will not in practice be enough places in the kind of detention centres which particular types of offender require.
For example, a boy with a rather dubious heart or a background of rheumatic fever cannot be sent to a detention centre based on the principle of a great deal of physical training in the morning and on all those other devotions to which so many people feel themselves dedicated. I wonder what will be done with that kind of person. We have never been told how the right hon. Gentleman sees the service of detention centres developing and how the system will work and what types of detention centre there will be.
The Bill is valuable and we support it and we have done our best to improve it and, for what it is worth, we wish it well.

Commander Courtney: The hon. Member has made some remarks about naval discipline. Can he explain the 76 per cent. success rate at the Naval Detention Quarters at Portsmouth compared with the 58 per cent. rate at civil detention centres?

Mr. MacColl: The Navy is a highly selective group of people chosen for what is regarded as the Senior Service of the Armed Forces. It is ridiculous to compare the Navy's problem with the kind of problem with which we are dealing when we are dealing with people who have probably been thrown out of not only the Navy, but every other Service and every uniformed youth service and everything else before reaching detention centres. This is a totally different problem and the hon. and gallant Member is kidding himself if he thinks that the brisk and breezy method which can be used for dealing with normal people

can be used to deal with subnormal people, those with whom we are concerned in the Bill.

1.30 a.m.

Mr. R. A. Butler: I do not want to detain the House for too long, but I should like to answer some of the points which have been made during the debate on the Third Reading.
I should like to express my thanks to those right hon. and hon. Members who have taken part in the discussions. I agree that it is a pity that we have to discuss the Bill late at night, and I thank the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) and the hon. Lady the Member for Leeds, South East (Miss Bacon) for accommodating the Business of the House by agreeing to take this at this hour. I think that is reasonable, otherwise it would have had to be taken tomorrow.

Mr. MacColl: It is rather like the new Clause which gave a choice of corporal punishment.

Mr. Butler: I should also like to endorse what was said by the hon. Member for Wigan (Mr. Fitch) about the work of the Joint Under-Secretary of State, both during the Committee stage and on the Floor of the House. Without him we could not have made proper progress with the Bill, and we are very much obliged to him, not least myself. I am also grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General for the help he gave during the Committee stage, and to my other right hon. Friend for his constant attendance, whatever subject it is.
When I look back on the preparations for the Bill, I feel modest about it. It is a Measure which I hope will carry forward a lot of reform. That takes up something which the hon. Lady said. It is not always only the contents of the Bill which matter; it is the effect of the Measure on the general stream of reform. The work, which started with an effort to follow up the Criminal Justice Act, which itself started in the 'thirties under the late Lord Templewood and was carried into effect by the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede), is carried forward, one generation to another, by this Bill dealing with young offenders.
I did not know that it was such a good Bill until I listened to the Third Reading debate, and I am grateful to many hon. Members for drawing my attention to so many good points in it. It quite cheered me up at the end of our deliberations.
The Bill is a great drive forward in the establishment of detention and remand centres which will mark a considerable milestone in reform, and, in answer to the hon. Member for Widnes, I hope that we shall be able to develop the detention centres in a variety of ways. They are at the beginning, and it is impossible, from the few specimens we have, to get a full impression of what the regime may be like.
That enables me to take up another point made by the hon. Member for Leeds, South-East. I honestly believe that what I said in the speech relating to Clause 23 about the future relations of the Prison Commission and the Home Office will be found to be true by future reformers, namely, that in my opinion we are only just at the beginning of correlating and bringing together the approved schools, the open borstals, the detention centres, the closed borstals and their relation to prison and the great variety of supervision for young offenders in this country.
I do not believe that the Bill is the last word. I believe that a successor of mine will carry the work further and will build on this work, but after very querulously demanding from my advisers whether we were doing enough in the Bill I think that we have on this occasion gone far enough, and that we must carry the work further on a future occasion.
This bringing together of the treatment of the young is only in its infancy and it is backed up in the Bill by something to which my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington, South (Mr. Roots) referred, namely, the provisions for after-care. They were also referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes).
Clause 20 and the Third Schedule are very important, and are also the beginning of a further reform which can be carried forward in the years to come. In fact, the Bill will have in it the seeds

of a great many important future developments, provided we do not sit back and take it for granted, and provided that all the provisions are built upon. My hon. Friend the Member for Ashford asked about voluntary work in after-care. I cannot say sufficiently strongly—whether relating to Lord Longford's work or the work of anybody else in the voluntary sphere—that we cannot do without voluntary effort. There will always be room for it in most spheres in England, and particularly in this sphere. Indeed, as the Welfare State develops and we try to take care of the individual or the family in a variety of ways, an intense burden falls upon the population, and especially the voluntary section of the population, which will become more and more onerous as we relieve the more unfortunate people of the physical troubles of life. These personal duties, such as after-care, will assume an importance in our society which is not sufficiently realised at present. Therefore, I believe that the provisions of the Bill are of great importance for the future. I am glad we have had this debate, in order to underline the effect of Clause 20.
I am glad that the hon. Member for Glasgow, Craigton (Mr. Millan) drew attention to what it is in order to mention in a Third Reading debate. It is in order to stick to the contents of the Bill; therefore, in referring to the Third Schedule, I am in order. We have reformed the Third Schedule, with the aid of my right hon. and learned Friend, my hon. and learned Friend and hon. Members opposite in Committee. The objections raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Carlton (Sir K. Pickthorn) have been found to be justified, and we shall now be able to say that the Schedule is satisfactorily and constitutionally drafted.
The hon. Lady and others have referred to approved schools. I do not want to make any further comments on them at present, except to say that I believe that the powers we have taken in Clauses 15, 16, 18 and 19 in particular will enable us to form and to continue a happy relationship between the approved schools under local authorities and the approved schools under voluntary managers. Voluntary managers have a distinctive contribution to make to the schools. They have


come in for a certain amount of criticism, but this is not because of the devoted work they do but because some people want to alter the general system.
I can tell the voluntary managers, on behalf of the House, that they can bring to the administration of these schools a wide range of ability and experience, and an ability to take a personal interest in their schools—and they have brought these qualities to help the individual children in their care. Voluntary management can be as efficient as management by local authority, and provides the opportunity for flexible efficiency and experiment. I am sure that we all wish the voluntary schools, in their new rôle under the Bill, a happy future.
The hon. Lady referred to prison work. We have recently received the first report of our advisory council on the employment of prisoners, and we are very much obliged to the hon. Member for Widnes for the part he plays as a member of it. We are considering its recommendations, and although it is not a matter especially affecting the Bill it was referred to by the hon. Lady and it is connected with the future of young offenders. There is no more important reform to be made in the work of our prisons than the provision of work of a healthy and constructive character for prisoners to do.
My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney) raised several points and asked some definite questions, one of which concerned the Cambridge report on attendance centres and the 62 per cent. success rate. I would rather reply to him in a few weeks' or months' time, when we have received the next report from Cambridge and I can compare notes with him. I believe that he was referring to the previous report, which we now regard as being not quite up to date. If I can keep in touch with my hon. Friend I can compare notes with him later, when we have received the latest report.
He also referred to the Goudhurst detention centre and wanted to know why and if the regime had become softer. I have visited Goudhurst, and I can tell him from my own experience—and I have checked this—that there was never

any doubling to work at that place. So there has been no deterioration in that respect.
My hon. and gallant Friend also asked about the practice of the staff wearing plain clothes. The reason why the staff at detention centres wear plain clothes is that that follows the practice in borstal where plain clothes are worn by the staff. If my hon. and gallant Friend wishes to discuss with me whether be would prefer the staff to be dressed as in the prison service, I will discuss that with him, but I am not at all sure that that would make a better impression so long as the spirit of the staff is not only strict but humane and the regime does not in any way deteriorate from what we hope will be a reformative and good method of treating the young offender.
In this Bill there are several provisions of some severity in the way of penalties. I sometimes think that some of my hon. Friends who have made critical speeches, however sincerely they feel, have underestimated the strictness of the penalties which can be applied under the Bill and have under-estimated the nature of the reforms of which the seeds are in this Bill I am quite satisfied that when reformers of the future look upon the efforts we have made as a combined House of Commons in dealing with this Bill they will find in it things which are valuable for the future treatment of crime. The present crime wave is a very serious one and one which we should all combine to combat. This Bill is by no means the sole method to use, but insofar as it has measures in it to which attention has been drawn in the Third Reading, it will be helpful.
I have been very modest about this Bill. It has raised many major issues and has been troublesome to steer through the House, but I cannot complain about the spirit in which it has been received on either side. I am grateful to hon. Members on both sides of the House who have wished the Bill well in its later stages. I hope that it will make some small further step in dealing with the terribly grave problem with which we are all faced.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

Orders of the Day — INVALID TRICYCLES, GLASGOW

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Peel.]

1.42 a.m.

Mr. Bruce Millan: Even at this late hour I am very glad to have the opportunity to raise the question of the repair and maintenance of invalid tricycles in Glasgow. I have already been in correspondence with the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland about particular cases and about the arrangements generally. I think that he will be familiar with most of the points I shall raise tonight.
My interest in this matter arose out of two cases from constituents and I should like to mention them briefly, although I am not raising this necessarily as a matter affecting those two cases, but rather as a general matter and I do not think I need mention the names of the constituents concerned. In the first case, after I had written to the Joint Under-Secretary, an application was put in by a constituent for an invalid tricycle. The application was made on 29th June last year and the tricycle was delivered on 19th October. That was an interval of three-and-a-half months. I found subsequently that it takes an average of about six months between the date of application and delivery, so in this case the interval was something less than the average, although it was a considerable time.
When delivered, the machine was found to be defective in that it was provided with hand controls and the applicant was unable to operate a hand-controlled machine. It took no less than three months, from 19th October to 15th January, before the adjustment to the machine was made and the hand controls were replaced by a foot-controlled clutch. This is an example of the sort of delay that concerns me because, on the face of it, this would not seem to have been a terribly difficult adjustment and could have been done in, at most, a week or two—which, indeed, was the time my constituent was originally told it would take.
The second case concerned, not the supply of a new vehicle but the repair of an existing one. My constituent had

an accident with his tricycle on 19th November, and as he was still able to run it until 16th December there was no question of its being completely wrecked. It went in for fairly extensive repairs on 16th December but, in all, that machine was in the workshop for six weeks.
I feel that those two cases are symptomatic of something wrong with the general arrangements in Glasgow both for the supply of spare parts and for the repair of these tricycles, and I understand from other hon. Gentlemen that there are complaints in other places about the arrangements for the repair and maintenance of these machines.
I got some information from the Secretary of State for Scotland as a result of a Parliamentary Question addressed to him on 14th March on the subject of repair and maintenance, and I think that the figures are worth quoting. I was informed that there are 206 invalid tricycles in Glasgow, of which 66 were issued in 1960, and that during 1960 the garages had 52 tricycles under repair for between two weeks and four weeks, and that 30 were under repair for more than a month. That means that out of a total of 206 machines, 82 were under repair, and that no fewer than 66 of those 206 were issued in 1960. In other words, about half the machines issued were in the workshops for over a fortnight during the year, and 30 were in the workshops for more than a month.
It should also be pointed out that these tricycles are used very largely by people who require them to get to work, and when the machines are off the road most of the people are either unable to go to work or are put to a great deal of inconvenience—and, in many cases, to a great deal of physical discomfort and pain.
It is also worth pointing out that a number of these people are in sheltered employment where, unfortunately, the wages are often quite low. Many of the people would, in fact, have a slightly higher income if they stayed at home and relied on National Assistance and so on, but they go to this work because they want to do something. It is terribly discouraging for them—when, in any case they have so little financial inducement to do this work—to be laid up, as so many of them are, for weeks at a time because their invalid tricycles have to go


to the workshops for repairs which seem to them to take a disproportionate time out of all relation to the work that needs to be done.
I know that the Joint Under-Secretary has said that the number of spare tricycles available in Glasgow—to be hired, as it were, by those whose machines are under repair—is being increased from 26 to 52, but I should like to know something about their condition. I have heard complaints about the condition of some of the spare tricycles. There is also the point that those who are used to a certain machine and have a particular disability are naturally reluctant to take, even for a short period, a vehicle with which they are not familiar and which their disability may make it difficult for them to operate. The actual supply of spare vehicles, while an important matter, is not inadequate by itself, but what we are giving is an inadequate servicing arrangement.
The Secretary of State has told me that there are five garages in Glasgow authorised to carry out repair and maintenance work to these vehicles, but the bulk of the work is done by the Scottish Ambulance Service at Cowglen, and by one other firm. Out of the £8,000 paid in 1960, no less than £7,000 went to the Scottish Ambulance Service and this other private garage, so that it is surely misleading to state that there are five garages doing this work. The remaining three make up a very small proportion of the total work, because in the remaining £1,000 which they must have shared, no account has been taken of the minor repairs which are done by various garages according to circumstances. It is necessary to bring in authorised repairers only when more than minor repairs are required, and, as I have shown, apart from the Scottish Ambulance Service, only one other Glasgow garage is doing this work. I make no criticism of that garage, but it does seem odd that in a city of the size of Glasgow there should be this inconvenience to disabled people caused because these two garages only are available for this work.
I have wondered whether the complaints about delays in servicing, and the disturbing figures which I have quoted, arise partly from the fact that there is no adequate number of garages

doing this very essential work. The other matter which would appear to be a legitimate source for criticism is the question of spare parts. The first case I quoted was of a new machine being delivered but found, subsequently, to be faulty in that it was necessary to replace one set of controls by another set. There, the real trouble was that it took three months before that second set was available. A lot of the delay seems to arise because spare parts are not available. On 14th February last the Joint Under-Secretary of State told me that the question of the stocks of spare parts held centrally in Glasgow was a matter which was being investigated; but this, after all, is a scheme which has been operating for a considerable number of years and it would seem to be an odd situation that an investigation into the spare parts position should be taking place only now.
There seems to be a lack of urgency on the part of the Government. I understand that this is a long-standing complaint, and one wonders why the stock of spare parts has not been increased long before now. I suggest that the real answer—and I think that the Joint Under-Secretary recognises this—would be to get rid of these machines altogether and to supply in their place small cars. I think that that will become Government policy, and therefore I expect no shattering announcement on those lines tonight. The satisfactory answer to all the difficulties—the tendency to break down, the complaints about the difficulty of manoeuvring, and so on—would be to supply small cars in place of these vehicles. In the absence of that, however, adequate repair and servicing facilities should be available. Without that—and I do not think that we have it in Glasgow—I shudder to think what the situation must be in other parts of Scotland, particularly in remote country areas.
I should like to have assurances tonight from the Joint Under-Secretary that the position in Glasgow will be considerably improved, because I know that many of the disabled people who must have these vehicles are happy to have them and are grateful in other ways to the Government for the facilities which are afforded to them but are nevertheless extremely unhappy about the repair and servicing position.

1.56 a.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. T. G. D. Galbraith): I am grateful to the hon. Member for Glasgow, Craigton (Mr. Millan) for drawing attention to the difficult problems which can arise in connection with the repair and maintenance of invalid tricycles in Glasgow. I do not propose to be drawn into the question of whether cars should be supplied. The hon. Member will realise, I think, that that is outside the ambit of what we are discussing tonight.
I have taken the opportunity provided by this debate to look carefully into our present arrangements. I have also visited the Limb and Appliance Centre in Glasgow as well as one of the garages which caries out repairs on tricycles, so that I could see for myself how the scheme worked. My conclusion is that, on the whole, the record is not as bad as one might imagine after listening to the hon. Member's speech. Nevertheless, I agree that in this sphere, as in many other spheres, there obviously is scope for improvement. I hope to be able to tell the House how we are going about achieving an improvement and to satisfy the hon. Member that we do not intend to allow the grass to grow under our feet.
Before I do that, however, it would be helpful to the House if as a preliminary I explained the procedure whereby a patient obtains a tricycle in the first place—particularly as the first case to which the hon. Member referred was not one of repair and maintenance but was a question of initial supply. Initially, a patient's doctor recommends the need for a tricycle. This recommendation is sent to the Limb and Appliance Centre at Belvidere, where, usually within a week or so, the patient is examined by one the Board's doctors, together with one of the technical officers, in order to decide what type of vehicle is most suited for him. This is what happened with the hon. Member's constituent.
The recommendation is then forwarded to St. Andrew's House. This is done in order to ensure that all areas apply the same standard. Orders are then batched according to the different type of machine required. The hon. Member will appreciate that these machines, although they may all look the same,

are very different. This batching process, together with the production process, usually takes from three to four months.
Of course, if the machine requires modification as well as merely being supplied, the period may be longer. That is what happened in the case of the hon. Member's constituent, because his medical condition had deteriorated in the meantime. If the modification is of a complicated kind—for instance, a change from right-hand to left-hand driving—it is carried out by the manufacturer. If the modification is of a simpler character but still, perhaps, quite complicated—for example, the substitution of a foot clutch for a hand clutch, as happened in the case described by the hon. Member—the modification will be carried out in Glasgow before the vehicle is delivered to the patient. The hon. Gentleman may think that such a modification is simple; but, although it is obviously simpler than changing from right-hand to left-hand driving the actual operation requires some fairly complicated engineering.

Mr. Millan: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but surely the point of the delay in this case was that the part was not available.

Mr. Galbraith: I am coming to that. I agree with the hon. Gentleman. I was trying to point out that even something which appears to be fairly simple may involve a certain amount of engineering expertise.
I should perhaps say that until now no order has been placed until arrangements for garaging the machine have been completed, and, of course, as the hon. Gentleman appreciates, this has sometimes caused additional and unnecessary delay. In order to avoid this delay I have now decided to arrange for the order to go through immediately, and the time taken to supply the machine can be used to make the necessary garaging arrangements.
This innovation, I hope, will shorten the time taken to supply a patient with his tricycle, and to that extent he ought to benefit from the change.
After the machine has been delivered, either the technical officer or a mechanic from one of the approved repairers attends in order to give the patient


lessons in the use of his machine—it was at this stage that the deterioration of the hon. Gentleman's constituent was discovered—and at the same time he explains to the patient how the repair and maintenance system works.
This, I think, is what the hon. Gentleman is really interested in and so I should like to outline the procedure which is followed here. So far as small repairs are concerned—that is, where the labour charge is less than £3—the patient is free to go to any garage he likes. But for more serious repairs or for routine maintenance the machine has to go to one of the approved repairers.
The reason for this arrangement is that these vehicles require specialised treatment which they would be unlikely to receive at an ordinary garage which had no experience of this class of work. Furthermore, by concentrating the work on a few garages it makes it possible for the 'technical officer to keep in closer touch with the work on the machine. It also means that the liaison between the technical officer and the repairer is obviously much better.
What happens when a breakdown occurs is that the Appliance Centre is informed and it arranges for the vehicle to be collected and repaired. On the other hand, when it is a matter of routine inspection, the patient will normally 'phone up the garage and a mutually suitable time will be arranged for him to bring in his vehicle; or, alternatively, the garage will collect it for him. That explains the procedure which I think is fairly satisfactory.
The problem with which the hon. Gentleman is really concerned is the time that it takes to carry out the repair. I have dealt with the build up of the time that it normally takes to supply a new machine. On average, as the hon. Gentleman himself said, it is six months, and Glasgow is not exceptional in this. The case which the hon. Gentleman was trying to propound was that the situation in Glasgow was worse than elsewhere. That is not so; six months is the average throughout the country. When I say "the country" I do not mean Scotland only, but England as well. Therefore, there is no question of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State being less efficient in managing this matter.
Where repairs are concerned, naturally everything depends on the nature of what has gone wrong. The routine inspection may take only an hour or so. On the other hand, if some unexpected defect comes to light, as it did in the steering of one of the vehicles which was in the garage which I inspected, a whole day's job may be involved, or even longer.
Where there is a major defect, for instance a broken crankshaft, part of the trouble is not only the complexity of carrying out the repair but the difficulty in obtaining the spares. I agree with the hon. Member that the service is perhaps not above criticism because the stock of spares is not as large as I think it ought to be. It is easy to say that, but the provision of spares to cover every contingency is a difficult matter because of the great variety of different types of machine, which is due partly to the fact that constant development and improvement is going on—nothing is standardised—and partly to the need to cater for different forms of disability. Our job would be very much easier if there were a uniform type of machine which could be given to all patients and which could remain the same for many years, but that is not the situation.
In spite of these obvious difficulties, the recent decision which has been taken to treble the number of spare engines held in Glasgow should go some way towards reducing the delays arising from lack of spares. Another improvement which I think will help is that in order to reduce the inconvenience to patients who are without a tricycle while their own machines are being mended, the number of spare tricycles available for loan has been increased to 10 per cent. of the total. I should say, by the way, that the figures which the hon. Member used were the total not just for Glasgow but for the whole Western Region. He asked whether they were all now on the spot. The answer is that they are not all on the spot but about two-thirds of the addition are. The figure of 10 per cent. on which we have decided is about twice the number of vehicles off the road for major repairs at any one time. It therefore should provide a fair margin for exceptional circumstances, but I agree with the hon. Member that it does not meet the need of a patient who cannot use an unmodified machine, and I agree


too that nobody likes to use a new machine temporarily when he has become used to his old machine.

Mr. Millan: Are all these spare machines new machines in first-class condition? I take it that there is no question of old, dilapidated machines being hired out.

Mr. Galbraith: They are either new or completely re-equipped machines.
The hon. Member asked about the time taken to effect repairs. I have checked the position in Glasgow and I find that the time taken is, as I indicated earlier, no longer than elsewhere. During the six months up to 30th September, 1960, the time spent in the workshop at one of the garages was about one week, although the total time for repairs was over three weeks—because of the difficulty in obtaining spare parts to which I have referred. As the hon. Member appreciates—he referred to it when speaking of one of his constituents—where a vehicle is being repaired after an accident the time taken is bound to be longer. Of the 30 vehicles which had been in for more than a month, to which my right hon. Friend referred in answering a Question put to him recently by the hon. Member, 14, or roughly 50 per cent., had been involved in accidents. Because of the panel beating and so on, these accident cases always involve more work and take longer to put right than an ordinary case.
I do not wish to place too much emphasis on this point, but it would interest the House to know that, in spite

of everything that the hon. Member said about complaints, over the last two years we have received only one complaint about delays in repairs. I accept that there have been many instances of minor grumbling and irritation caused to patients—that is bound to happen, for it happens when ordinary people take their car to a garage to be mended—but actual complaints of delay have been remarkably few. Perhaps the fact that the complaints that I have referred to have come from the hon. Gentleman's constituents may have given him a wrong impression of the quality of the service.
I think I can say without any complacency that my inquiries have shown the standard to be reasonably speedy, efficient and thoughtful. I was very impressed by the sympathetic attitude of the mechanics at the garage that I visited, for they gave me the impression that instead of regarding the vehicle just as another job to be done, they actually care about what they were doing and took a personal interest in the patient's well-being. They showed a remarkable knowledge of the different cases with which they had dealt.
Though I feel that the service is in reasonably good heart and that in Glasgow it is certainly no worse than anywhere else—not only in Scotland but in the United Kingdom—this will not prevent us from trying constantly to improve it still further so that those who are incapacitated and have this dreadful burden to bear will get the best treatment that we can possibly provide.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at eleven minutes past Two o'clock.